Hazy
by Astoria Potter
Summary: "Because I love you," he says it simply. The night air around him seems to let out a soft sigh once he utters those words. He says it as though it is a fact - like the fact that she is the best he has ever had. Finnick/Annie.
1. Part 1: The Beginning

Update: **NOMINATED FOR SADDEST STORY/BEST TRAGEDY AT THE SUMMER 2010 THE HUNGER GAMES FIC AWARDS! **Thank you so much to **KenoshaChick**! (:

**CHOSEN AS THE FANFIC PICK-OF-THE-WEEK AT THE MUTTATIONS PODCAST, WEEK 4! **Wow! Thank you so much! It's truly an incredible honor! (:

People have been reviewing and PM'ing and recc'ing that I split this into parts so that it is easier to read, so here they are. Hope it helps! (: It _is _still a one-shot, just into chapters of sorts. (:

Story: "Hazy"

Author: Astoria Potter

Word Count: 25,356 (Does not include header and notes)

Beta: Mars

Disclaimer: No copyright infringement is intended and no money is being made. I just like _The Hunger Games_. (: I also do not own Rosi Golan, from which this story title comes from.

Summary: One-shot, COMPLETE. He fell in love with her not once, not twice, but eighteen exhilarating times. Times that were sometimes messy and imperfect, that were either in happiness or in anguish, but the one thing that they all shared was the beauty in them. How he will fall in love with her once more when he saves her, if he is able to make it out alive. Finnick/Annie.

Pairing(s): Finnick/Annie, Peeta/Katniss

Rating: TV-14/PG-15/NC-16 (Violence, [multiple] deaths, sexual content, teh sex, depression, morphling use, alcohol, et al)

Spoilers: All the way through "Catching Fire."

Begun: 30 September 2009, 11: 03 P.M.

Completed: 24 February 2010, 09: 40 P.M.

Ranty Notes & Acknowledgments: The idea of Finnick/Annie intrigued me right away because even though she is only seen once, on a TV screen, and we have literally no description of her aside from that (besides relying on comments and tidbits of conversation here and there from the other characters about her and what she is to Finnick), she is an important and key character in the book, especially pertaining to Finnick, who fast became one of my favorite characters. At first we think that he's this bad boy-slutty-murderer who could really care less about anyone else, but of course he proves us that notion wrong and turns out to be one of the most deep, insightful, and caring characters in the novel. I think it's sweet how Finnick can have anyone he wants but how he chooses Annie, a poor mad girl that no one pays any attention to. The minute I finished _Catching Fire_, I began to type out the ideas that I had in my head for a one-shot based on these two characters. But that writing proved to be lacking and difficult, and I put it on hold, occasionally coming back to it now and again, but mostly forgetting about it and focusing on other things. A few months ago, I came back to it, deciding to change what I had originally started with. Instead of Finnick and Annie meeting each other for the first time at the games, they were changed childhood friends. This made a lot more sense to me than what I had begun with, mainly because although I do believe (call me a traditionalist when it comes to this, but I'm a real romantic at times) in the soul-mate concept, I don't think that you can fall in love with someone else right away. Serious like and infatuation, yes. But not love. It doesn't form in a matter of days or a couple of weeks. Often times it takes months or years for you to really, truly love someone in the you're-the-One way. Perhaps in the olden days, you could look at someone and fall in love at first sight. But times change, and the world changes with it, as does the nature of love. I mean, just look at how we toss the word around so much today. Someone "loves" your hair. Another "loves" you for picking up a dropped object for them. But that's not love. When we say it like that, it becomes meaningless, and there is no real value. Often times we say that we love people that we have just met or friends that we barely know, all because the meaning of the word has become cheapened.

True, _real_ love is messy and complicated and will break you as much as it will make you happy. It's not happy like so many of us are led to believe: there are complications and so many stumbles along the way. There's a quote by La Rouchefoucauld that says, "True love is like seeing ghosts: we all talk about it, but few of us have ever seen one." So many people spend their entire lives searching for the One, but how often are the odds of us finding him or her? There's a reason so many of us turn to the world of fandoms for solace, besides the creativity and imagination: there, true love can be crazy, but it's there, and the fact that is gives us comfort that it exists, nurtures the thought that we, too, can find someone just for us. Most of the time, though, we turn to someone who is good enough. Good enough, but not who we're looking for. I think that's the beauty of Finnick and Annie: that out of everyone, there is only her, and no other. Maybe that's what draws some of us so strongly to this pairing: we'd all like to think that there's an insightful, caring, mysterious, gorgeous bad-boy who is actually incredibly deep, who will look beyond the surface and love us for who we are inside.

Wow, that was more ranty than I set out to be. Anyhow, enough of that. When I finally finished writing this, I sent it off to my beta, Mars, who had a very hectic schedule and could not get it back to me until recently. This fic has been the hardest thing that I have ever had to write, but it has also been the funnest.

Also, my concept of where District 4 was and where I later found it is assumed to be is completely different. So let's just pretend that global warming did some weird wonky ice thing and it snows there. (:

That being said, there are many people that must be thanked and that I gratefully acknowledge in the process of making and writing this fic. Firstly, to my wonderful beta **Mars**, who although she can take excruciatingly long to get back to me, always does her best. No one could ask for a better critic and friend. (: **Megan** (mhannas), who, although not in the fandom, answered my countless questions. **Mia** (xalexandriam/Alexandria Malfoy), who is the best online friend anyone could ask for. **Marla** (cosmicteardust of YouTube) and starespace for all of those insightful talks on the randomest of things. **Jennifer** (coltlady) and **Jamie H.**, who both agreed to read _The Hunger Games _after I went endlessly on and on about it and for letting me rant on. **thehgtribute at Twitter** for answering my overload of questions. To everyone over at **Rath & Ruins**: thanks for providing a place where I could unwind. To my** Livejournal f-list**, thanks for bearing with me and although most of you had no clue as to what I was talking about, thank you for giving me your thoughts. To everyone over at **Livejournal's** **demigod_elite community**, thanks for all of the laughs and cabin frenzy_. _To **Suzanne Collins**, for providing us with a series where every sentence is quotable and that has brought us all together. To **all **of _The __**Hunger Games **_**trilogy fans**, thank you for providing all of us with one of the best, funnest, and drama-free fandoms there is to be in. To **you, the reader, **thank you for taking the time to sit down and read this. And last, but most certainly not least, **to all lovers of Finnick/Annie**, because it is a beautiful, beautiful thing. This story is for you.

Hazy

A/N: The title of this story comes from the song "Hazy (featuring William Fitzsimmons)," by Rosi Golan.

_"I watched you sleeping quietly in my bed._

_You don't know this now but there's some things that need to be said._

_And it's all that I can hear, it's more than I can bear._

_What if I fall and hurt myself?_

_Would you know how to fix me?_

_What if I went and lost myself?_

_Would(n't) you know where to find me?_

_If I forgot who I am,_

_Would you please remind me?_

_Oh, because without you things go hazy."_

Part I: The Beginning

Finnick Odair has always been sure of everything. Well, almost everything.

All of that will change when he meets Annie Cresta for what must be the thousandth time. But he doesn't know that, of course. How can he? How can he know that she will turn into the girl that is supposed to be his secret? Amidst all of the screaming fangirls, the blur of women, of the feel of their skin brushing against his, all he will think of is her, only her. But he can't possibly know that, not now.

Later, he will remember the first time that he saw her. It is a hot, sweltering, uneventful weekend day - a Saturday, to be precise. He was ten years old, the summer sun had just begun to set, and he was pulling in the catch of the day when he heard the patter of familiar footsteps. He considered the trouble that he would be in with his mother before remembering that he'd rather face that than the screaming mass of girls led by Celia Mayton that would assault him in their desperation to get a piece of the stunningly attractive Finnick Odair. Finnick had known, ever since a very small age, that he was a beautiful child, and that he would grow up to be one of the most exquisite-looking people in Panem. It wasn't arrogance or an inflated ego, it was an accepted fact of life - like the fact that the sun set in the sky every day, that you needed water to survive.

He takes his net of fish and finds himself climbing up one of the nearby trees just in time to see the girls come crashing through. "His boat looks like it was just tied up," Celia says matter-of-factly in a very bossy tone as she observes the old, wooden dock. "See how there are still ripples in the water?" The other girls nod enthusiastically in agreement. "It means that he's nearby!" she proclaims, as though she has just made the greatest discovery since sliced bread. "Finniekins!" she cooes out.

Finnick winces from his spot in the tree, trying not to let out a gag of disgust. He is repulsed. Finniekins? Really? Could one get more uncreative? He is so distracted and disgusted that he isn't aware of the group of girls that have inched closer to his hiding spot. Shoot. He'd rather have a head start than be caught like a brainless idiot in the tree.

He finds himself bounding gracefully from the tree and then making a run for it in the opposite of his usual direction, dashing as fast as he can down a path that he doesn't know. He can hear the excited screams and dash of hurried footsteps a distance away from him, and he knows that he has to get somewhere, somehow - and fast. But where is there to run to? He thought that running a different path than he usually did would throw off those who were after him - and it did - but now he sees that it has also cast him into a state of vulnerability, because he has no clue as to what is going on.

Maybe it is that he is so preoccupied that he doesn't notice it, but before he knows it, he finds himself flying into a figure on the street, who has just a split second to realize what is going on before he crashes into her.

"Ow," the girl mutters, and Finnick hurriedly draws himself up, shoving aside his net of fish before holding his hands out to help her up. "Thanks," she says, but he sees the scowl on her face that matches the glare in her eye.

He can't help but grin at her. The setting sun spills a few rays of sunlight onto her hair, and it catches the beautiful brown color that immediately mesmerizes him. It's not just one brown that seems to flow endlessly, but all different shades of it - coffee and chocolate and hazel and mahogany and caramel and beige and burnt sienna and café au lait - that come to life, that make him want to run his fingers through it and comb it for her, this girl that he has just met.

The sound of distant but fast-approaching footsteps stops both of them short.

"Finniekins!" he can hear Celia shrieking.

He lets out a visible shudder. The girl quirks her eyebrows, clearly amused. "Finniekins?" She is unable to control a snort of laughter that escapes her lips.

He makes a face at her, and the next thing he knows, she is grabbing his net of fish and dragging him with her. He finds them stumbling through a maze of abandoned alleyways, and when they stop, he realizes that they are on the outskirts of town. Just beyond the barbed wire fence that looms ominously just feet away, he can see the crashing waves of the ocean. They both sit down against a wall, out of breath but trying to laugh nonetheless. "Thanks," he says after a few long minutes of silent laughter.

She shrugs. "It's fine. I wouldn't want your pretty face to be mauled by a bunch of obsessed lunatics."

He smiles at her. "I'm Finnick," he says, holding out his hand to her. "Finnick Odair."

"I know," she laughs quietly.

"You do?" He gives her a puzzled look. He is sure that he has never met her before, for if he had, he would most definitely have remembered her.

She smirks. "You're all the girls in the schoolyard can talk about."

"Oh," he says, feeling slightly stupid.

She lets out another burst of laughter before her eyes carefully assess his form. "You're going to be late getting home, aren't you?" she observes. He nods, but says nothing. "Well," she draws herself up, "I have to get going as well."

She is walking away from him when he realizes that she hasn't told him her name. "Wait!" he shouts.

"Yes?" She turns around, her eyes dancing with laughter.

"What's your name?" he hears himself asking.

"Annie," she says. "Annie Cresta." Annie Cresta. The words ring through his ears, and although it is a rather plain name, he likes it. Finnick finds himself walking through the streets until he finds himself in familiar territory. The street that contains his family's shop looms into view, and he makes his way towards it.

His mother is furious when he returns. She is going on and on about how she has been worrying over his late return, and how can he do this to her? He's always been such a good-for-nothing creature, and he doesn't even consider his family. Does she want him to beat some sense into him? Because she can, she's missed doing that. How many days has it been since the last occurrence? His father comes in and is shouting at her, telling her to lay off of her son, and then they are screaming at each other. Finnick is tired, so tired of this daily ritual where his mother finds an excuse to berate and degrade him and his father jumps to his defense, sometimes not early enough.

He is sitting on the steps that lead to the shop when he hears a set of footsteps behind him. The figure plops down next to him, and he finds himself looking into the eyes of his father, who wraps a protective hand wrapped around his shoulder. "Is she still screaming?" he inquires, even though he already knows the answer.

His father nods. "Was it that Celia Mayton girl again?"

He gives a slight bob of his head before letting a visible shudder pass through him. "Yes."

"Finnick..." His father's tone is serious, so serious that Finnick turns and looks into the eyes that are peering at him. They are sad and full of solemnity and tinged with regret.

"Yes?" he asks quizzically.

"Don't be like me when you grow up." His father looks as though he is a million miles away.

"What?" Finnick can't help the astonishment that floods his voice. "But Dad, you-"

"Shh," his father puts a careful finger to his son's lips, "just listen to me, Finnick." Finnick finds himself nodding, and he stares at the man in front of him. "Your mother and I-" He seems to be struggling to find the right words. "Just remember to marry someone that you love when you grow up, Finnick. Not who your mother tells you to."

"Marrying for love," Finnick repeats slowly as his father stares at him. "That isn't why you married Mother, is it?"

"No." His father shakes his head. "There was a girl that I loved once, Finnick. She thought that we would end up together, and so did I. But I let my parents choose whom I should be with, and look how it's turned out. I don't want that for you."

Finnick has nothing to say to this. Instead, he sits there in a strange silence with his father as they gaze out onto the street, and after what feels like a very long time, they head inside.


	2. Part 2 : The Start of a Beautiful Thing

Part II: The Start of a Beautiful Thing

The next day he heads out, this time to the ocean. He has only been there a couple of times, because his mother has always screamed and ranted about how he will drown and then what will they do if they lose their stupid little son? But he is filled with a sudden urge to defy her, to not end up like his father has, and so he sets out. He has reached the dock, and after greeting the cheerful captain, he boards the boat. He sees a familiar figure that is standing by the railing of the fishing boat, her back turned to him. For a moment, he thinks that his eyes are playing a trick on him, but when he blinks, she's still there. An excited grin breaks across his face, and he makes his way towards her.

Her eyebrows rise in astonishment upon seeing him. "You again?"

"You make it sound like it's a bad thing." He smiles at her.

She laughs, loud and unashamed. "I never thought I'd see you here."

He shrugs. "A lot of things that you never expect to happen end up happening anyway."

She returns the smile. "Shall we?" she asks, and he nods as they both sit down and busy themselves with knotting the fishing net.

"You're good at this," he observes, watching her skilled fingers work at a blurring pace.

"Thanks," she laughs. The sound is magical, like music to his ears.

A few minutes later, they are done, and soon afterwards, the fishing boat takes off. The waves break almost soundlessly and they are busy, busy finding fish to catch in the nets and spear with precision. It is routine work, but it is exhilarating and mind-occupying nonetheless. The day seems to pass by in a blur, and by the time they have pulled into the dock it feels as though only twenty minutes have gone by.

The next day is Monday, and he finds her sitting by herself in the school-yard, a bored look on her face as she does her homework. When he sits down in front of her, she will let out another laugh of hers. He will ask her whether she would like to come with him and go fishing.

She makes a face at him. "That's all we do here, Finnick. Fishing."

He is about to tell her that they could do something else when he sees her eyes dancing with silent laughter. "You," he gets out, trying to fight the grin that is threatening to surface on his face.

"Me what?" She gives him an innocent look, tilting her head to the side before she begins to laugh again.

That afternoon, once school was out, he finds her in the school-yard once more. They walk to the peaceful lake that he ran from the day before, and they sit together on the wooden dock, their feet dipping into the warm summer water once they cast their shoes aside. That is the first day. Eventually she will trust him more, and their tentative friendship will turn into something firm and beautiful and wonderful.

And that was what it became. Every weekend, he finds himself rushing out to the ocean dock. Every weekday, the moment school ends, he finds himself finding Annie in the school-yard, and together they will run off to the quiet lake, watching in fascination, observing its calming beauty before they get aboard the small, old boat that has enough room for four people. They will slowly row down the lake, and sometimes they will sit there and talk. Other times he will get out his trident and see how many fish he can catch, and other times they will sit together and weave nets.

It is during these lazy afternoons on the lake that they have all to themselves that Annie will learn everything there is to learn about Finnick, and he, in turn, will learn everything there is to know about her. She will learn that he is skilled at glassblowing, something that his father has taught him to do. He will learn that her father died long ago, killed by the multiple stings of a nest of tracker jackers that he had unknowingly stumbled upon. Her mother fell into a depression afterwards, begging her daughter not to wander near the outskirts of the District, where her father have been killed. Finnick listens to her with a sort of fascinated horror, and she will shoot him a look afterwards that says she won't take his pity over this and the fact that she has to sustain her family.

Many days they train together for the Hunger Games, as all the children in their district have since they were small, preparing themselves if the inevitable were to ever happen to either of them, or perhaps both. The people in their district glory in a chance to participate, and the best that the both of them can do is be prepared. There are some things that she is more learned at than he, and some things that are the other way around. They climb trees and look at plants and run and fence with wooden branches and camouflage and throw knives and shoot arrows and lift weights and learn how to start fires and make shelters. Some days they train together near the lake, and other days they go to the free lessons given by their ambitious district. Finnick discovers that he is quite handy with a trident, and Annie learns that she is good at throwing knives.

Celia Mayton and her gaggle of followers stop stalking him at the lake once they see him there with Annie. For a while, they stand from a distance and watch, but there is nothing that they can do about it, and eventually, Finnick is no longer stalked by his admirers. The girls at school will shoot Annie envious glares, jealous of her closeness to him, but they both laugh it off. They are best friends, and nothing more. They need each other, they care for each other, they support each other, but the one thing that they are not is lovers. Finnick's mother doesn't seem to believe that, and she takes any chance she can get to badmouth Annie, talking about what a low-class good-for-nothing tramp her son is associating with. He immediately jumps to her defense, and his mother gives up for a while before she starts in on it again.

And so the years fly by. The year of his triumph at the Hunger Games, Annie will turn thirteen, and Finnick will become fourteen. For her birthday that year, he will give her a glass seashell that he has made, and she will laugh and then hug him. For his birthday, she will give him a scarf that she has woven, made of bits of cloth that she has been collecting for a long time. He will wear it during the chilly winter days, and often times he will wear it during the non-winter days as well, much to everyone but Annie's bewilderment.

Girls will give him longing looks in the hallways, women will shoot him glances in the streets, and he will stare through them, bored, before exchanging a conspiratorial wink with Annie. Everyone tells him that he can do better. What is good about her? What is so attractive about her that makes her different from everyone else? There are girls that are far prettier, far more attractive, who not only have this in their arsenal but also experience, which is something that Annie lacks. But he doesn't need to explain to everyone that Annie is the most beautiful person that he has ever seen. And everything is perfect, so perfect, or so they think. Everything will be perfect until the reaping for the sixty-fifth Hunger Games takes place.


	3. Part 3 : Proving Something

Part III: Proving Something

Finnick has long been filled with an urge to prove to his mother that he is something greater, that he is better than all of those things that she calls him as she screams at him and tries to beat the living daylights out of him. Perhaps this is what she wants, to taunt him and call him a coward until he is pushed to the brink, pushed until he does something that in other districts will be called recklessness, but here in District 4 is the standard.

It is the night before the reaping when his mother comes storming into his room as he is sleeping, asking him if he has trained enough, if his worthless self will be ready if he is called tomorrow. She asks him why he doesn't have the guts like other boys, or perhaps it is because he doesn't want to ruin his pretty, vain face? It is clearly bait, but Finnick is so angry that he doesn't care. He lets his mother goad him, lets her words cut him and follow him the next day. And so, when the time comes for the reaping, as Annie stands next to him, her worried eyes looking over him, her knowing look telling him that she knows without having to ask that something is wrong, he finds himself volunteering to be a Tribute.

Later, in the Justice building, his father will give him a sad look and a farewell hug. His mother will curtly inform him that perhaps he has some guts in him after all. His friends will tell him not to forget what to do in the arena. And finally, Annie, who will hug him fiercely, who will tell him that she will be waiting for him to come back, that she knows he will be the one to win because he is the best of the whole lot. "Don't join the Careers," she whispers to him. He will kiss her on the forehead and tell her that he will be back before she even has time to think about it, and then he is being pulled away onto the train by the robed Peacekeepers, and he can feel her sad, large eyes watching him until the train is nothing but a tiny dot in the distance.

Here he will meet Mags, who will be one of his mentors, who will come to mean so much more to him. Everyone in the Capitol will be immediately enamored with him, and Mags and the other mentor instruct him to act as vain as possible in order to trick the other Tributes, in order to buy him time until they all realize much too late that he is the one they need to kill. It doesn't matter how vain he is, because everyone is falling at his feet. Here is where he realizes that beauty can buy you nearly everything. Not everything, but just about. It won't be until later that he realizes all of these things come at a terrible price - his friendship with Annie, for one - but he doesn't know that now. He can't possibly.

He is more than pretty, he is beautiful, and he doesn't even need to act vain in order to win, because the other Tributes are idiotical enough to think that something - someone - so beautiful will never be able to do any lasting harm to them. A week and a day into the Games, he knows that he will win. It isn't his ego-tripping; it is a conviction that he believes. He needs to win, because he needs to go back home to Annie. Annie, whose scarf that she wove him is the token that he chooses to bring with him into the arena. Annie, his best friend who spends the lazy afternoons floating with him in the lake as they laugh together. He takes the knife in his hand and tosses it up and down. He needs to go back and see her, watch her swim so beautifully and gracefully, so unlike anyone else in their District. He looks down from his vantage point up in the tree. No one can see him from here, and they will never suspect him of being up here anyway. They all think that he is too stupid, too much of a pretty-boy to even know how to do this, despite the fact that he is from a Career District. Everyone tells him that the way that he swims is so flawless, that it is a thing of beauty when he does so, but they have never seen Annie swim, or they would never say that. They have not seen her dive or the perfect strokes that her arms make or the way that her legs move when she does a flip or how serene she looks when she floats, when she leans back and closes her eyes. Beautiful, beautiful, she is so-

He is broken out of his reverie as a cannon booms loudly, in perfect sync with a large silver parachute that comes sailing towards him, maneuvering through the branches of the tree and landing in his lap. He doesn't have to unwrap it to know what it is, but his fingers hastily open the package anyway. And there it is, a golden trident, the few rays of the sun that spill through making it glisten and gleam, and he thinks of Annie's beautiful hair, with its many different exhibitions of brown. And it is here, now, at this moment, that he knows that he is going to win, because he has made a promise to her, and she is the one good thing that has ever happened to him, and he can't break that vow that he has made to her. It isn't about proving something to his mother, or getting the glory that the victor will receive. No, it is all for Annie's sake, what she wants; that makes him know, without a doubt, that he will win.

While he weaves his net out of vines, he thinks of how when he gets back home, the first thing that he will do when he is free is run with Annie to their lake. He will find vines and flowers, and he will make her a crown out of it, a crown just for her and no one else. He will place it in her radiant hair, and it will not be able to do the beauty of her vibrant chocolate tresses any justice. He weaves, and he thinks of Annie sitting next to him, helping him or weaving a net of her own as they wait for the fishing boat to leave the dock, as the ocean's waves crash softly around them.

It is so easy after that, so simple. He lies in wait, and soon enough, one by one, they are all his. They scream and writhe, but he has no mercy for them, because they are the other Career Tributes who he saw mercilessly slaughter others, some of whom were children. There is a sort of smug satisfaction that he has when he sees the look of astonishment on their faces when they see who it is that has speared them through their chests. He can see the disbelief etched in, as it finally registers in their minds that he, Finnick Odair, the beautiful, vain boy, is the one who has made them meet their end. And he sits there patiently, slowly going mad, wondering, and the cannon booms once more, finally, and then there is the cheery voice announcing that he has won followed by the sound of trumpets and the roar of the screaming crowd in the Capitol that is streaming to him through the live speakers. It is his turn now to be shocked, because even though he knew it, he didn't know that it would be over so soon. He thought that it would take longer, that he would have to lie there waiting for days and days, but he has really, truly won.

When he is finally home, he finds himself running to Annie at the train station. Her eyes are bright with tears, and then he is hugging her, his arms enveloping her. "Didn't I tell you I would come back?" he murmurs into her hair.

She is crying and laughing and he ignores the furious glare of his mother. "You idiot!" she chokes out happily when he finally lets go of her. "Why did you let her goad you into volunteering?"

He gives her a sheepish smile, and then she is laughing and hugging him again and again and everything is perfect, because he is safe now.


	4. Part 4 : Victory & The Things That Come

Part IV: Victory & The Things That Come Afterwards

And it seems like everything is perfect, like it will all last forever, because now that he has won he is able to live in the Victor's Village, and he is able to help her family. There is something good that has come out of these horrid games, and it is that Annie is able to not want for anything. She marvels over the medicine that she can give her mother and the hot water in the shower and the non-seafood dishes that she is able to taste. Ice cream and cookies and chocolate and a hundred other delicacies that they spend hours making in the kitchen on the snowy winter days, days where he also invites old Mags over. He delights in seeing these two people smile, in seeing the happiness on their faces.

Often times he will fall into a fitful sleep, dreaming of the other Tributes, of how the ones that he has killed are coming to get him, and now he is afraid in a way that he was not afraid during the Games. He will be screaming and Annie will come running, and her cool arms will wrap around him, her fingers holding his hands, and she will whisper that everything will be all right.

He tries to ignore the hungry glares of the women during the Victory Tour, women whose eyes promise him something that he has never tasted. But he is a fourteen-year-old adolescent boy, and one cannot blame him when he allows himself to succumb to the taste of their lips and for their hands to travel up his shirt, for his fingers to fumble clumsily underneath their fancy dresses. He allows himself to kiss their naked skin and for them to kiss him all over in turn, but nothing more than this. Annie gives him a hostile look when he informs her of this, but then she is laughing again. He doesn't know why, but he asks her if she would like to kiss him. Her nose wrinkles in disgust, and then she is laughing again, and then they are both shaking with laughter, but Finnick cannot shake away the feeling of uneasiness and - what is it? sadness? - that jolted through him when she looked so horrified at his proposition.

When it is summer again, they head out to the lake, the lake that is theirs and no one else's. They spend hours lying together on the boat, floating in the lake, feeling the warmth of the sun on their faces as they lie down on the old wooden dock. Sometimes he falls asleep, but when she's there, there are no nightmares that consume him. He does not dream of the Career Tributes using his own net to trap him and then spear him through the chest like he did to them. When they fall asleep on these lazy afternoons, his hand will find hers, and they will stay there like that for those few perfect hours. Some days she will go into an angry tirade about how the Capitol has damaged him with the games, and she will question why they all sit idly by and let these horrors happen. He clamps his hand over her mouth, because even in their secret lake, they are not safe from the Capitol's eyes and ears. He makes her promise not to tell anyone what she has told him about the Capitol, begs her, because he can't stand the thought that anything would happen to her, what would happen if the Capitol found out that she was speaking this way. But he sees how much her eyes gleam with hate at the Capitol when he wakes up screaming from a nightmare, and he is so afraid for her. He pleads with her, telling her that she has to learn not to say anything, because by not saying anything against the Capitol, this is how they all remain alive, not captured and tortured.


	5. Part 5 : Death & Anguish

Part V: Death & Anguish

Perhaps it is because everything bad seems to fade away with Annie, perhaps it is because his parents no longer have to work and thus his mother cannot scream at him except over "that harlot", that he does not realize it at first. One day he comes back from walking Annie home, and when he steps into the kitchen, he sees his mother at the kitchen, laughing and smiling. He walks cautiously towards her, and then he turns cold when he sees the needles and packets full of morphling that are strewn all over the table. He is shaking her and yelling, asking her what she has done. She is still laughing, and she asks him why it has taken him so long to realize that she has been taking morphling, is it because he is a stupid little boy who doesn't know anything? He clenches his teeth, keeping himself from flying at her in a rage, because even though she has never loved him, she is his mother.

He doesn't know where she got the supply, but he finds himself finding the stash of it that she has stored. Annie holds his hand as he dumps them all in the ocean, her face solemn, her eyes wide.

But the inevitable happens anyway, because his mother finds a new supply and she takes so many at one time with bottles of alcohol that she bought at the market, that such an overdose of them mixed with liquor is deadly. Everyone knows that. Then she begins to scream at whatever is coming for her, something that only she can see. He is crying and trying to hold her but she doesn't know who he is, doesn't even know that he's there, and all of a sudden his mother goes limp in his arms. She has stopped writhing and the saliva has stopped foaming at her mouth. His father comes bursting in, and he sees his son screaming. The life seems to go out of his father's eyes, and then it is all a whir as the coroner comes and proclaims her dead from an extreme overdose of morphling mixed with alcohol. Annie holds his hand at the funeral, silent tears streaming down her cheeks. But he is numb, so numb inside, and there are no tears left for him to shed. His father seems even more dead than he is, and Mags shoots Finnick sharp, worried looks.

That year, when the Capitol invites him once more to attend the Hunger Games, he accepts it more enthusiastically then he did the last year, finds himself eager to go. The women can touch him fully now, because he is sixteen, sixteen and more painfully beautiful than ever, a cherry that is ripe and ready to be picked. Annie begs him not to go, but he shakes his head sadly and tells her that he will be back before he knows it. She sees him off at the train, and there is a sad, farewell look in her eyes when he kisses her forehead, and then both of her cheeks and her nose.

Physical human comfort, the feel of being able to bury himself within someone else - it is such an excruciating pleasure, something so exquisite that he wonders why he has not surrendered fully to them before, why he has refused to come here last year. The feel of bare skin, of forbidden areas, of being able to pleasure himself and another human being - it is an art that he becomes skilled at. He ignores Mags's concerned and knowing looks, because even though she cares about him, she couldn't possibly understand. This way of washing away pain is so easy and comes to him so simply, why hasn't he thought of it before?

Some days he will think of Annie's disgusted face and he will push it away, because she never has to find out, does she? He is stupid to think that, because the rumors about his skill with women and how quickly he goes through them spreads through the Capitol like wildfire and follows him back home to District 4. She says nothing of it at all, and that is the one thing that frightens him. He expects her to be angry or to fly at him in a rage, but she does none of these things. Only when she is eerily calm is something wrong. But no matter how much he asks her, she refuses to admit it, refuses to give in and tell him what is on her mind. Their relationship has not changed, but he often wishes that she would tell him what it is that she is hiding.

His father becomes obsessed with glassblowing. Finnick knows that his father never loved his mother the way that a man loves a woman, but he had loved her, just like Finnick had loved her, despite everything. Even though she was horrid to both of them, always degrading and screaming, he wonders why both of them are so affected by her death. Perhaps it is because she was the one constant in their lives that they knew would never change: no matter how much everything around them altered, she was always be there to holler out how ungrateful and disgusting they were as she took a stick and hit them over and over again. It is unexplainable, but that is the best way that Finnick can put it. His way of dealing with his grief is with women, and his father's way is to immerse himself in his work.

Skin after skin after skin - they are all a blur. He will take anyone. The ones with the plain names and the ones with the more unusual ones. The attractive ones and the simpler-looking ones. The ones whose families have had wealth and prestige for generations, and the nouveau riche. It doesn't matter to him, he takes them all. He takes them, and then he tosses them all aside afterwards. They are all the same: they admire and fawn over how handsome and chiselled he is, they fangirl over how he is "really, the best Victor ever!" and other such nonsense.

They are all so expendable, so usable, so empty-minded, so pea-brained - so unlike Annie and Mags. They shower him with gift after gift after gift, thinking that it will make him stay with them. But they should know better, because Finnick Odair doesn't stay with a woman that he beds for long. They may retain him for the next few days, but by the next week, he is on to someone else. Annie delights in making fun of them with Mags, ranking the women from their disposability to their appeal to how soon he will be rid of them. There are times when he feels so dirty afterwards, not because he enjoyed it, but because of the way that Annie would look at him, as though she can see through him. Those will be the days when he will do his best to get the scent of whoever it is off of him, disposing of the bed-sheets and vigorously washing himself in the shower for hours upon end.


	6. Part 6 : Falling Out & Realization

Part VI: Falling Out & Realization

There are not so many days by the lake now. Five afternoons turns into Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday turns into Tuesdays and Thursdays. Their weekends on the ocean turn into Sundays. Sundays turn into every other weekend. The lazy afternoons and weekend days become less and less, but Annie never complains, not once. He overhears her telling Mags that if turning to other women is his way to heal his pain, so be it. So be it even if it costs her so much of their time together, because if that is what he needs, it is what she will give to him. Something strange swells inside of him when he hears it, and he slumps against the wall in - Defeat? Sadness? - something that he cannot describe. He has been doing everything so selfishly, not even thinking of her feelings, of how this has affected her. He has taken and taken and taken and has not given her anything back, not once.

True, he has given her all of the gifts that the women who visit him shower him with, but reflecting on it, that is such a slap in the face to her. How can he have missed the insulted look that she wore whenever he put them in her hands? How is he to know that she throws them in the trash the moment she exits the Victor's Village? He catches her doing it one night. He has only been hurrying after her because he wants to ask her if she wants to meet up the next afternoon by the lake.

"What are you doing?" he hears himself asking.

She spins around guiltily, slamming the trash lid shut before facing him. "Nothing." She gives him a bright smile, but it doesn't match her fearful eyes or her squeaky voice.

He walks to the trash, opening the lid and seeing the present inside. "Oh," he says. He isn't really angry. After all, he has never questioned as to whether she has wanted them or not. He has simply kept on giving them to her.

She seemed to think that he is, though. "Well, what did you expect?" she snaps. "You want me to have the leftovers of your stupid conquests, like I'm your idiotical little lapdog-"

"Annie," he says, closing the lid and gently wrapping his fingers around her wrists. "Annie, that's not-"

She blinked. "I have to go, Finnick. My mom is waiting for me."

"Annie!" he shouts after her as she runs away from him. "Annie!"

He trudges home that night, feeling foolish and more horrible than ever. When he stumbles into the house, he is surprised to see his father sitting at the kitchen table, drinking a bottle of liquor. "Hello, son." His father smiles up at him. Finnick says nothing, but takes a seat across from him. "Problems with women?" Finnick doesn't respond. "Or is it little Annie Cresta?"

"She isn't little," Finnick frowns immediately.

"No, she isn't, is she?" his father asks in a soft voice. "She's grown up to be such a beautiful young woman, hasn't she? You know, if you aren't too careful, you're going to end up losing her."

"I think I already have," Finnick informs his father. "Or I've started to, anyway."

"Then get her back," his father says, as though it is the simplest task in the world.

Neither of them say anything for a long time. There is the occasional swooshing of the alcohol bottle as his father takes a long gulp and the maddeningly slow ticking of the clock, but nothing else. Finally, his father speaks again. "She's going to make a beautiful bride, Finnick. You know that, don't you?"

"She's only sixteen, Dad," he says, the incredulity spilling into his voice. "You can't expect her to go shopping for a husband right now, do you?"

"And I'm President Snow," his father smirks at him. "I'm telling you, Finnick, if you let her go, someone else is going to sweep her off of her feet and you won't realize that she isn't there until she's gone."

"What are you suggesting?" Finnick blinks. "That I propose to her or something? Dad, I'm only seventeen. Besides, Annie's my friend, and that's all. There's nothing else going on between us."

"Yes, and cows fly." His father quirks his eyebrows.

"Actually," Finnick straightens up, "they experimented with those in the Capitol, but they didn't provide anything useful to help District 11 with their agriculture, so they ended up-"

"Oh, Finnie." His father shakes with a sort of deranged laughter. "What am I going to do with you?"

After his father has fallen into a drunken heap on the floor, Finnick carries him up to his bedroom, tucking him in and looking at the man who has taught him so much. So much, but not nearly as much as Annie has.

His father informs him the next day that he will be busy in the workshop, and not to disturb him. There is something strange about this request, but Finnick will not think on that until later. Not until days later, when he will wander into the shop, worried about his father. Not until he stumbles into the workshop and finds his father's unconscious form hunched on his table, beautiful glass forms scattered all around him. They are all seashells, in a hundred different shapes and sizes. He tries to shake his father awake, and a hole begins to spread through him when he cannot wake him up. The sound of his yelling is what brings a robed Peacekeeper inside. They say that the cause of his death is that he has worked himself to death. No eating, no drinking - just working on completing the glass seashells that are all strewn about in a beautiful mess.

Annie comes to the funeral, and he runs to her immediately. He is sobbing like a little boy but he doesn't care that anyone is watching. All that matters is Annie's hands wrapped around him that make him feel safe, Annie's voice that soothes him, that lies to him that everything is going to be all right. She is half his family now - she and Mags are all that he has, the only ones who matter, the only ones that he cares about.

She stays with him that night, holding his hand as he falls to his knees on the floor and sobs into her shoulder as though he were a child. She places the blanket over him, tucks his head into the pillow. When he wakes up, he finds her asleep on a chair that she has drawn up next to the bed, her hand still entwined with his.

But he knows the inevitable will happen. He knows that he will look for the same source of healing - he will drown himself in the comfort of the women who lust after him, will add their names to his lengthy list of conquests. Annie never says anything about this, because she knows that it is what he wants - no, more like what he _needs_.


	7. Part 7 : Betrayal & Recognition : There

Part VII: Betrayal & Recognition / There Is Nothing I Wouldn't Do For You

There is one afternoon when he is supposed to meet her at their lake. He is finishing up work on a seashell that he had been working on for several days now. He is busy wrapping it up in a box when a familiar-looking young woman comes striding into the shop.

"Hello, Finnick." She smiles at him, batting her eyelashes. "My, how you've grown."

"Do I know you?" he asks, perplexed.

"I'm surprised you've forgotten me, Finniekins." She winks at him.

"Celia Mayton?" He quirks an eyebrow.

"Yes!" she laughs, as though they are the best of friends. Which they are not and were not and would not ever be. That is something that only he and Annie share. But for some stupid reason, he keeps on talking to her anyway, and of course the inevitable has to happen. They stumble into her house, and he is thinking about how she is boring him to death with her stupid talk about party dresses and the latest fashions in the Capitol. But he allows himself to indulge a little, to have the feeling of bare skin against his once more. It is only afterwards, when she is going on and on about how handsome and amazing he is that he realizes, with a jolt of horror, that he had promised Annie he would meet up with her. His eyes dart to the clock. It has been three hours. Three hours since the allotted meeting time. He jumps out of the house and runs, ignoring Celia screaming obscenities after him and that his shirt is inside-out. He runs to the glassblowing shop, unlocks the door, and picks up the box with Annie's present, and then he is running faster than he thought possible to the lake.

She is lying on the unmoving boat, her eyes closed. "Annie!" he shouts as he jumps into the lake and swims to the boat, which is sitting in the middle of the lake.

"Hello, Finnick," she says when he climbs into the boat, her eyes not opening.

"Annie, I'm so sorry," he breathes, out of breath. "I didn't-"

"Didn't what?" She lets out a short laugh, and she sits up, her eyes blazing with anger. "You didn't mean to keep me waiting here for you for hours on end?"

"Annie-"

"You know, I didn't realize that Celia Mayton was so important to you," she says in a quiet voice.

She hasn't slapped him, but she might as well have. "What?" He blinks.

"That's who you were busy screwing for the past couple of hours, right?" she says calmly, although he can tell that her emotions are threatening to bubble over and surface. "While I was sitting here thinking that you were different from what I'd thought."

There is no sense in denying it. "How did you know?" he asks, trying to steady himself even though the boat is in no danger of tipping over.

"You reek of her," she spits out, and the way she says it makes it sound as though he has just exited the sewer.

"I-"

"Not to mention that your shirt is inside-out," she continues. There is a long pause before she speaks again. "Celia Mayton, Finnick? I would have thought that you'd have more class than that."

"Annie," he says.

She ignores him. "Now, is there anything else that you'd like to tell me? Because I think we're quite-"

"Annie," he says, his tone placating. "Please."

"No!" she shrieks, and he can see that the tears that she had been holding back are now flowing freely. "I trusted you, Finnick! I thought that you were different! There's nothing-"

"Annie." It seems to be the only word that he can says.

"I hate you, Finnick Odair," she hisses, and when she says it, he can see that she means it with every fiber of her being.

Those words defeat him more than anything else that she could have used. But since he is a masochist, he moves towards her anyway. "Annie," he says, making his way towards her, his arms wrapping around her.

"Get off of me!" she shrieks, shoving him so roughly that he falls off the small boat.

"Annie," he says as he coughs water out of his mouth. He reaches into his pocket and takes out the small box, placing it on the boat.

"I don't want your gifts, Odair," she spits out. The way that she calls him by his last name cuts him like a knife. "We're quite done here."

He is floating, floating on the immobile lake, not knowing and not caring. He wanted to fix things with Annie, and now that has all gone to pieces. Something between them had broken the moment that he had chosen to leave the glassblowing shop with Celia Mayton instead of rushing here to find Annie. Something precious, something... something... something...

Sometime later, after the sun has set and Annie is long gone, he finds himself swimming to the wooden dock. The only comfort that he allows himself to indulge in is that she has taken his box with him. Probably to smash it into a million tiny pieces, but at least she has taken it with her.

She ignores him when he comes to the school-yard afterwards. Every time he attempts to talk to her, she will walk into a throng of his sighing fangirls, who desperately beg for his attention. By the time he manages to brush past them, she will be long gone. Whenever he heads over to her house, the knocks go unanswered. One time her mother opens the door and informs him that he is mistaken, no one by the name of Annie Cresta currently lives here or ever did. Which is a lie, and they both know it, but there is nothing that he can do. He goes to the ocean every Saturday and Sunday, but she is never there. He sees her once, coming back on the boat that had left from the dock at the earliest possible time, before the sun had even risen in the sky. He ducks behind another boat before she can spot him looking at her, although he has a feeling that her eyes have already found him. Every weekday he finds himself running to their lake after school is let out. He will float in the lake, lie in the boat, take a nap on the dock - but it is all to no avail.

That is how six months pass by. One Saturday afternoon, driven by impulse, he finds himself walking to the lake. When he arrives, he sees that the boat is no longer tied to the dock, and is nowhere in sight. He sits on the dock, waiting for whoever has taken it to come back. It doesn't take very long. Within a matter of minutes, the boat appears, and Annie is sitting in it, rowing and humming a song to a bird perched on her shoulder. She has such a beautiful voice. The moment she sees him, the singing stops. Her smile immediately fades and her eyes turn cold. When she arrives at the wooden dock, she ties the boat to the dock, studiously ignoring him all the while.

She is walking away when he reaches out for her. "Annie," he says, his hand on her arm. "Annie, please." She doesn't respond, but she stops walking. "Annie, tell me what I have to do to fix things-"

"You can't." She turns to him. "Out of all the things that you can have and that you want, Odair, the one thing that you can't have is our friendship."

"Please," he begs. "There has to be something-"

"You broke us!" she screams, and she looks as though she is about to cry. But she is so strong, his Annie. So strong, and for her to cry is for her to show defeat and a weakness that she wants no one to see. "You broke us the moment you chose Celia Mayton over me, Odair, so don't you dare come around telling me that there is something you can do to fix it."

"Annie-"

"No." She shakes her head. "No. Goodbye, Odair," she says, and walks away.

He doesn't know how long he stands there, watching her disappear, watching her until she is nothing but a dot in the distance, and even when that dot disappears.

Finnick is filled with despair, a despair that brings him lower than he has ever thought possible. There is nothing that can fix this. Losing Annie is worse than losing his mother and his father. Knowing that he can never get her back, that it is his fault, consumes him, and he is afraid that he is going to go mad. Every day that she is gone feels like an eternity. He would have done anything to get her back. Even if it meant going through those horrid Hunger Games once more, he would have done it to get her back. All she has to do is tell him what do, and he would do it. He needs her in the way that he needs no one else. And this is when he realizes that he loves her. Loves her not as a friend, as he thought he has all these years, but something more. Loves her in the way that a man loves a woman, that his father loved the girl he never married. He tries to pinpoint when exactly this had started, but he can't. When they were children? Before he left for the Hunger Games? During the Games? When he returned? Or perhaps it was that he had fallen in love with her time after time, again and again, deeper and more seriously each time? But that doesn't matter. All that matters is that he is in love with Annie. He remembers his father's words: _You won't realize that she isn't there until she's gone._ And it is true, every word, because he hasn't realized how much she means to him until now, hasn't realized that she is the one for him, the only one that he will ever love this way.

Without her there to keep the nightmares at bay, the dreams come flooding back. He would wake up screaming, sure that the dead Careers that he had skewered were coming to get him. Sometimes it would be his mother injecting him again and again with morphling and forcing him to drink alcohol afterwards, but the worst dreams of all would be when Annie would stand there, her eyes betraying no emotion as she watched him writhe in agony.

She still stops by in the Victor's Village to talk to Mags, who tells him how she is. He knows that Annie will not talk to him, doesn't want to see him. To be able to have her so near but being unable to speak to her is some sort of torture that has been devised specially for him by the Capitol, he is sure. He leaves her notes and what must be dozens upon dozens of glass seashells. She leaves them untouched, but knowing that she has seen them is enough for him.

During his trip to the Capitol that year, he tries to find as many women as possible. He must have set some new record, even for himself. Every time he tells himself that he is able to erase himself of Annie, but every time he thinks of her. It is inevitable, and after the first nineteen women, he stops trying to fight it. Threesomes and foursomes and fivesomes and sixsomes and sevensomes and eightsomes and then some. There is one girl, though - Johanna Mason, one of the previous Victors - who seems to know. "There's someone back home that you love, isn't there?" She seems more amused than ever.

He says nothing. "I didn't know it was your business to pry into these things, Johanna."

"Oh, it's not," she says, laughing. "But don't you think that you're hurting her by doing this with any woman in the Capitol who wants you?"

"I can't hurt her," he says. "Not anymore."

"And why is that?" She seems intrigued.

"Because she doesn't want me anymore," he shrugs.

Well. There is nothing that she can possibly say to that, because she doesn't know Annie at all. But when she leaves, she kisses his cheek and tells him to keep on trying.


	8. Part 8 : Fixing Us

Part VIII: Fixing Us

It is the day of her eighteenth birthday when he is finally able to speak to her. Mags decided to throw a party for Annie at her house, and besides her mother, he is the only other person who shows up. Annie rises in anger and indignation when she sees that he has come, but Mags whispers something in her ear that makes her sit down in her seat. After dinner is over, her mother and Mags somehow have some "very urgent business" to attend to and promptly disappear, leaving the two of them alone.

"You've grown," is all she says.

"I missed you." His eyes drink her in.

"I've heard," she nods. "Hard to admit it, but I missed you too."

"Annie, I-"

"You're sorry, I know." She blinks and leans back in her chair, her eyes peering at him.

"I never should've been late that day," he says. "It was stupid and if I could go back and change it I would."

"But it happened anyway, didn't it, Odair?" It is more of a statement than a question. "Just like everything that you do."

"Do you think we'd be all right now if it never had?" he ventures.

"I suppose." She gives a shrug of her shoulders. "But eventually you'd probably have ended up doing something stupid like that anyway, so we might be in the same place we are now."

"You really believe that?" He leans forward in his chair and looks into her eyes.

"I don't know," she whispers. She is looking at him then, her eyes merciless as they bore into his, and he remembers that his father had once said that eyes were the windows to your soul. If that were true, he is baring everything for Annie to see, everything that he is and ever has been. She is leaning closer and closer, and for a delusional moment, he thinks that she might kiss him, something that he has been aching for since he was fourteen. Instead, she places her chin in her hands and blinks at him. "Perhaps."

"We can't ever go back to what we had, can we?" he asks her.

"I don't think so." She shakes her head as she gets out of her chair.

"But we can try, can't we?" He knows that he sounds desperate, but he doesn't care. Anything to let her know how much he needs her.

She stares at him for what must have been a very long time. Finally, she says, "Fine."

"Really?" He can't keep the happy incredulity out of his voice as he stands up.

"I guess," she sighs. "Although I don't think I'll be very lenient towards you this time-" He is hugging her, letting her know how much he has missed her. Nothing - none of the countless women he has bedded or all of the gifts in the world - can compare to this. He breathes in the scent of her familiar hair. His grip is so tight on her, he is so afraid to lose her, so glad that she has given him this one chance to prove to her- "Ow," she mumbles into his shirt. "You're squishing me to death, Odair."

He withdraws immediately. "Sorry." He gives her a sheepish smile.

"Yes, well, that hurt." She shoots him a look, but he can tell that she is fighting to keep a smile from breaking loose across her lips.

They are lying on the floor later, feeling very drunk (although they weren't). "So where have you been this year?" Finnick hears himself asking.

"Hmm?" she asks drowsily. He can tell that she is almost asleep, but not quite. "Oh, this year?" she repeats his question.

He nods. "Yeah."

"I just went on different days," she says. "Ocean on weekdays and our lake on weekends."

_Our lake_, she said. A thrill goes through him. It _is_ theirs, but having her say it makes it seem all the more real. "Ah," he says.

"But you already knew that, didn't you?" She rolls over to face him. "You got that all figured out, Odair." She pokes him playfully in the chest.

"Ow," he says half-heartedly.

She laughs. "Good night, Odair."

She is asleep within a matter of minutes. He stares at her, and he allows his fingers to reach out and tuck a few stray tendrils behind her ear. "'Night, Annie." He kisses her forehead. "Love you."

There is the nightmare again. It is the same every time, but he is always seized by the fear and the knowledge that he will never get out of this alive. He is caught in a net that someone is weaving, and he is screaming and screaming, but no one comes to let him out. It doesn't matter how much he struggles or how loudly he yells, because no one comes. The fingers are still working on the knots, and then he sees the face that looms above his. "Hello, Finnick," Annie says, smiling serenely at him. "I'm almost done."

He can't help the jolt of horror that goes through him. "No!" he shouts. "Annie!" He is screaming and screaming her name, begging her, his hands clawing at the precise net that she has woven. There is the sound of footsteps approaching, and then there is another figure standing above him, and Finnick sees that whoever it is is holding his trident that he used to slaughter the other Careers in the arena, ready to spear and skewer him with his own weapon, to turn it against him. Where it once saved his life, it will now murder him.

"Don't worry, Finnie." She is beaming at him. "It'll all be over very quickly."

He is screaming out Annie's name again and again as his chest is sliced open, screaming it over and over, and oh, he is going to die, but this is the worst of nightmares, because Annie hates him so, has happily aided in his capture and murder, and when is-

"Finnick!" There is a familiar hand that is gripped in his. "Finnick, wake up!"

His eyes fly open, and he sees Annie's worried, familiar face looming over his. "Annie?" he manages to croak out.

"Oh, thank god," she breathes, still not letting go of his hand. Her other hand reaches out to feel his forehead. "You're going to be sick," she says matter-of-factly, but her eyes are laced with worry.

Suddenly, embarrassingly, he begins to sob uncontrollably, his whole body racking with the sound of them. Her arms wrap around him, and she is murmuring soothing words into his ear.

And things slowly - slowly but steadily - go back to being all right. Days at the lake, weaving nets together before they go fishing in the ocean, her helping him with his glassblowing, him baking with her - not a day goes by when they don't do something together, and Finnick realizes that with her, he has been happier than he has been in a long time.

All of the other women need to have amazing physical beauty or be incredibly skilled in bed in order for him to be even slightly impressed or stunned by them, but with Annie, it has never been that way. She doesn't need to put on makeup or throw her hair back or wear pretty clothes or prep herself. She is always beautiful, the most beautiful person that he has lay eyes upon, and she doesn't even know the power that she exerts over him with this beauty of hers.

It is a day that they are baking cookies that it happens. They are all alone in his house, and Annie is busy mixing dough in a bowl when he throws a handful of flour at her. She looks up, frowning, but then she sees the conspiratorial grin on his face. They are busy throwing flour and dough and chocolate chips and eggs and vanilla and a hundred different ingredients when it happens. They are both covered in ingredients, the cookies long forgotten, and the two of them have collapsed on the floor, shaking with laughter. Finnick looks at her, at this beautiful young woman lying next to him who means everything to him, and he blurts it out before he can help it. "I love you."

She blinks, but she has stopped laughing, and the smile disappears from her face. She scoots closer to him on the kitchen floor, and her fingers trace his face. He shiveres. Then there is the feel of flour in his face, and Annie is laughing. "I got you!"

He is coughing it all out, trying to brush it out of the rest of his face. "Annie!" he protests weakly.

She is still laughing, but he can see in her eyes that she has registered what he has said, that she knows that when he said it this time, he didn't mean it just as a friend. But what would she do with it?


	9. Part 9 : The Way That I Love You

Part IX: The Way That I Love You

They go out to their lake the next day, and when they lie floating on the water, their eyes closed as the sun shines down on them, her hand finds his, and she keeps it there. A thrill goes through him, because this time when they hold hands, it means something else entirely.

There is a day when they are sitting together on the couch. She is absorbed in a book and he has been writing a poem in his notebook, something that he has taken up with lately. She always demands to see them, but he always tells her that she can see them when he is done. The truth of the matter is that most of his poems are about her, and that he can't bring himself to show them to her without having to confess to her all over again that he is in love with her. So instead, he shows her the ones that he writes about Mags and the water. He notices the slight disappointment in her eyes, and he dares to hope that it is because the poems he shows to Annie are not about her.

Suddenly, without warning, she snatches the notebook that he has been writing in out of his hands. He has been so absorbed in looking at her that he doesn't realize what has happened, at least for a moment. When he does, however, he reaches out reflexively to get it back.

The look in her eyes is what stops him. She looks up at him, her eyes filled with something like wonder and relief and love as she stops flipping through the pages. "You wrote this?" she is asking.

He gives a slight nod. "I know they're horrible and you're probably going to say that they all lack-"

"You wrote these for me?" she asks.

"Yes," is all that he can say.

He is so afraid that she is going to burst into laughter, but she doesn't. All she says is a simple, "Oh."

And somehow she is leaning forward, and her lips meet his. She lets out a soft sigh, and his fingers runs through her hair and travel down her back, and she tastes like the summer sun and the ocean breeze and water and sugar cubes. They are tentative, slow at first. It isn't hesitation, but mostly because now that they finally have each other, there is no need for them to rush it all out. Soft and slow, and then after a few minutes, neither of them has any patience, and his lips are tasting her, telling her how long he has wanted this. They come up for air after what must be several minutes, and both of their eyes are filled with heady desire. His lips are crashing into hers once more, and he is tasting her, tasting her as she is surely tasting him. The feel of her lips against his, exploring his mouth, is so delicious, and he never wants her to stop, because the sensation is so-

There is a loud knock at the door, and they both spring apart. "Finnick? Annie? Are you two in there?" It is Mags, of course.

"Yes?" Finnick asks as he opens the front door.

"I just want to remind that the Mayor invited us all to dinner tonight since the reaping is in a week, so I was thinking-" She blinks and looks at him, and he knows that she sees the flustered look on his face and the way that he is touching his lips. "Oh, never mind," she says cheerily. "I'll leave you two to it."

But they don't do anything once he shuts the door. There is a slight awkwardness that settles in the air, and Annie looks embarrassed when he comes back to sit next to her on the couch. But their hands find one another's, and they stay there like that as she reads her book and he writes his poetry about her.

A few days later, they are sitting on the couch again, and as he stares at her, he marvels over how he can ever have thought of her as plain. He doesn't care what anyone else says, because she _is_ beautiful, is the most beautiful person that he has ever laid his eyes upon. He can't help but lean forward and press his lips to hers. Everything seems to happen in a frenzy after that. Her fingers are gripped in his hair and he is running his fingers through hers in exchange, and her lips can't seem to get enough of him, and then he is carrying her up to his room. He is asking her if this is what she wants, because they can stop. She kisses him in response, and then they are tripping towards the bed, and her hands are moving nervously up his shirt before she lifts it over his head. Clothes are in the way, something not needed, and there is such a shy look in her eyes, embarrassment and nervousness laced together with heady excitement and desire and wonder and - most important of all - love. They are kissing, kissing all over, kissing everywhere in little places that he has never thought of as sensual but were most definitely so right now. His fingers are exploring her, and then his mouth, and she is doing things for him with such a nervous confidence. He doesn't want to hurt her. She isn't like the other women who mean nothing to him, who are so expendable and useless. Her fingers are raking into his back so hard that she draws blood from his skin, but he doesn't care. He wants to feel the pain, because he is sure that what she is about to feel is a thousand times worse. He is doing his best not to hurt her, and he can see that she is doing her best not to cry from the pain, but the tears come spilling down her cheeks anyway. A pool of blood flows from her, out onto the stark white sheets, spilling, and it is all over and it seems like so much. Later, he will morbidly reflect that is as though a killing has just taken place. He is telling her how sorry he is, over and over, the sound echoing throughout the room. He is kissing her eyelids, telling her that everything is going to be all right, whispering again and again that he loves her.

He holds her afterwards, his nose nestled in the warmth of her hair, his arms wrapped protectively around her as they both drift off to sleep. They are safe, and there is nothing in the world that can come and change that.

The next morning, however, when he reaches his hand out to feel for her in the sheets, she is gone. His eyes flutter open and he sits up in the bed. He watches her hastily putting her clothes on before he finds the will to speak. "You're leaving?"

She spins around, and looks as though she were a child who has just been caught stealing candy at the store. "Hi, Finnick." She smiles at him. "I have to go. My mom's probably wondering where I was last night, and I have to-"

"Annie," he says, and his voice is filled with sadness. "Annie, please."

"I'm sorry, Finnick." She shakes her head. "But I can't."

"Why not?" he asks. He gets out of the bed and walks to her.

"Because I can't," she says, as though it is the simplest thing in the world, as though it is an easy fact that anyone can understand. "Don't you see, Finnick? I won't become-"

"So you're being a coward." He lashes out before he can help it.

She pales. "That's not what-"

"Yes, it is." He lets out a harsh laugh. "That's always what you say. That you can't do all of these things because of some stupid reason or another, because you don't want to get hurt. You just want to spend the rest of your life acting strong when you're not really doing anything. You're just cowering at home under a cover of safety."

"Shut up," she says.

He doesn't really seem to care at the moment. He will regret these next words later, regret them for the rest of his life, but he says them anyway. "You're no better than any of those cowards in the other Districts who evade the Hunger Games," he spat out. "You're such a coward that you'd never volunteer for-"

She slaps him, hard. "Shut up, Odair," she says. Then she is gone, heading down the stairs and slamming his front door shut.

A sense of horror goes through him as he realizes the implications of his final words. He is running out of his house, sprinting down the path that leads out of the Victor's Village, his feet bringing him to her house. "Annie!" he shouts. "Annie, I didn't mean what I said, I didn't-"

She opens the door, and her expression is unreadable. Blank. "Yes, you did, Odair."

So they were back to that now, were they? The last-name basis? "Annie, listen," he pleads. "I love you," he says.

"I know," she says simply.

"So why is it so hard for you to choose to love me back?" There is such desperation in his eyes, desperation that only Annie, and no one else, has ever seen, like many other things. "Stop trying to hide from the world." He is begging her.

"I'm not hiding," she lies.

"You were when you wouldn't take the risk of being hurt by someone else," he says.

"You think that's what this is?" she asks.

"I know that's what it is." He stares at her.

"Go home, Finnick," she says in a tired voice.

There is nothing else that he can do, nothing in her expression that says that she will move from her standpoint. He goes to their lake, sits on the dock for hours and hours before he finally finds himself walking back to the Victor's Village.


	10. Part 10 : Repeat Of It All Over Again

Part X: Repeat Of It All Over Again

It is three days later that the horror begins. Five years later, he will remember that day as if it is happening all over again. He will recall sitting in a chair, at the mandatory event, viewing the selection of the Tributes as the traditional ho-hum event went on. He will recall the announcer hollering out some name of a female Tribute that he can no longer remember. Relief shoots through him, but then he sees Annie calling out loud and clear that she is volunteering as a Tribute. He will be frozen with a kind of desperate fear, and when her eyes catch his on the stage, she shoots him a challenging look.

A twelve-year-old boy, Theodore Tristam, is chosen as the male Tribute. Immediately, a boy who is an exact replica of him steps up, yelling loudly that he volunteers as a Tribute. His name is Eliot Tristam, and Finnick knows immediately that he can only be Theodore's twin, they're such exact clones of one another. The only way that you can tell them apart is that Theodore looks as though he is in shock, while Eliot tries to hide the excitement and fear in his voice.

Love. That is what motivates Eliot, what makes him volunteer for his brother even though he knows that the odds are against him, despite the fact that he is from a Career District. Finnick knows now, is surer than ever before, that that is what he feels for Annie. Not the same type of love, but it is love. That is what he felt once for her - as though she were his sister - but he knows now that things have changed. Things have changed, and he knows that whatever the outcome, he will always love her.

He finds himself in the Justice Building afterwards; her last visitor. "Annie," he hisses out.

"What?" She stares at him, her eyes unseeing.

"Why did you do it?" he asks, even though he already knows the answer.

"Because I'm not a coward, Odair." She gazes at him. "I owe you that much."

"Annie, do you have any idea how stupid and insane and crazy you were to-"

But their time is nearly up, and she stands up. "I'll come back," she says, as though it is the simplest thing in the world, as though it is an achievable solution. Then the Peacekeepers are leading her away, and he is screaming and yelling, but it is no use.

But he is Finnick Odair. He is Finnick Odair, and things like this have solutions. Solutions that are unavailable to other people but limitless - open, achievable - to and for him.

He sees her eyes register surprise on the train ride to the Capitol when she watches him stride into the compartment. She is chatting animatedly with Mags and Eliot before he politely interrupts their conversation and asks if he can join them. The look in her eyes is murderous, and he gives her a smoldering wink. Eliot stares at him. "You look familiar," the little boy blinks at him.

He opens his mouth to speak. "I'm Finnick," he says. "Finnick Odair."

Eliot nods, as though this is a very important piece of information that he is absorbing. "I've heard about you," he says. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm mentoring you for the Games," he says matter-of-factly. Annie chokes on her soup. "Is something wrong?" he asks her in a false, cheery voice.

"Oh, no," she says smoothly. "It's just - you, mentoring us?" She frowns at him. "I thought you'd be busy finding your next string of women." He doesn't miss the inflection of jealousy in her voice. It is fleeting, but it is there.

"Priorities change," he says in a soft voice. She looks away from him just as Eliot and Mags exchange a conspiratorial look. He watches her throughout the train ride, smiles as she gives Mags that pouty little frown that he has always adored. She isn't like any of the other women that he has known, like all of the admirers that he has met in his long nineteen years. She is studiously ignoring him, but to have her here in front of him is enough for him, enough for now.

Finnick is immediately intrigued with her all over again, falls in love once more, falls in love like he did the night that she gave herself to him. No woman or girl has ever acted so strangely to him before, and he loves it, because it is purely an Annie thing. The rest of them just prance about and simper about how beautiful he is. He supposes that thinking this makes him a bit of a narcissist, but isn't that what they all think he is? He has always had the ability to attract women as though he were honey and they were bees. He is a sumptuous feast laid out before them, but the truth of the matter is that they are the feast to enjoy, not him. But she has been the only one that is different.

Her. Annie. His Annie. The one that he loves.

Later, he will tell Katniss that he wishes she were dead, but it isn't in the way that she thinks, and he knows it in his heart of hearts.

It is her long and flowing brown hair that caught his eye when they first met, and it is one of the things he loves most about hers. He remembers her eyes darting around after he first slammed into her when he was running away from Celia Mayton, eyes that betrayed the slight annoyance and amusement that she felt. He will observe those eyes now as she speaks to everyone but him. His eyebrows quirk as his eyes sweep over her form, and he marvels at, and is terrified by the fact that she has volunteered to represent their district.

They arrive at the Capitol in the late afternoon, when the sun has just begun to set.

That night, after questioning Mags, he finds himself walking to the rooftop. She doesn't turn around, but she knows that he is there. Her ears perk slightly, and when he looks at her, he sees that there is an amused tilt to her lips. "Hello, Odair," she says.

None of them have ever greeted him on a last-name basis, none of them but her. This girl is his first in so many ways. "Hello, Annie." He smiles at her.

She stares out into the night for a long minute before she finally breaks the silence between them. "What brings you up here?" She isn't looking at him.

"I couldn't sleep," he lies.

She lets out an amused snort that she doesn't bother to hide. "You couldn't sleep?"

"Is there something wrong with that?" He turns his eyes to her, searching.

"From what I've heard, you should currently be busy having some Capitol idiot nibbling at your neck and screaming out your name. Or are you telling me that I'm wrong about that?"

He can't help it. He laughs, because she is absolutely right. "What of it?"

"The real reason you're up here right now isn't 'I couldn't sleep,' is it?" She throws him an exasperated look.

"No, it's not." He shakes his head, liking her - no, loving her - more and more with each passing moment.

"Do you want to explain why you're up here with me instead of going at it with some dumb Capitol bint like you two are bunnies?" She raises her eyebrows.

He quirks his brows reflexively. "I think you already know, don't you?"

"What of it?" She shifts, and she is facing him now, her arms crossed defiantly and a look of bored contempt in her eyes.

"Why don't you tell me since you know so much?" He is grinning. She says nothing, and he lets out a laughs. "Humor me, Annie. Unless you don't have the nerve-"

She moves towards him so quickly that all he sees is a blur. Her hands are placed roughly against his chest, and she is shoving him back against the wall. He can feel her fingers through his shirt, and they are warm and soft. Her hair is beautiful, he notices once more. He has a sudden, strong urge to runs his fingers through it, but his thoughts are interrupted by the young woman who is busy fuming at him. "Here's what I think, Odair. You're so used to being one of the most stunning, gorgeous people on the planet and getting whatever you want. You just expect everyone to fall at your feet and do whatever you want, and it works, because it's true that you're sensuous. So here you are, probably expecting me to be stunned by your alluring self or whatever it is that you like to think about yourself in your pea-brained head."

"Go on." He's still smiling, but the amusement in it doesn't reach his eyes, which have stopped dancing with laughter about ten seconds into her rage.

"See, you can't believe that there are women out there who aren't actually drooling over you like everyone else." She pokes a single finger into his chest, and he feels a jolt of pain. Not because what she has done hurts, but because what she is saying is perfectly true. But it is also because he loves her, and he wants to make her understand that. But if he tells her that now, she will refuse to believe him for a very long time. Perhaps even forever, and that will be irreparable. No, he cannot tell her that now. He can shout it out to the rest of the world, but the only person who cannot know at this moment is her, and her alone.

"Go on." He swallows, his voice seeming a thousand miles away as he repeats his words. They seem to be the only four letters that he can says.

"You're beautiful, Finnick," she says, and when she says it, she doesn't say it in an awed voice like the others do. She says it as though he is an abomination, and he can hear the disgust that is laced in her voice. "You're so beautiful that anything you want is yours, and that's why there are some women who don't drool over you. You're beautiful and it makes you repulsive, because you're so terrible to look at."

He lets out a choked laugh, and he doesn't know if it is a plea or something else. "Stop."

"You're beautiful, and that beauty is going to destroy you someday." She gives him a sad smile, and the jab of her pale finger into his chest is half-hearted this time.

"Stop," he says, and now he is begging her.

Her eyes look up at him, and they say what she will not. That she pities him right now, as though he is a sick puppy. It isn't why she loves him, but right now, it is what she feels, along with her fear. That she feels sorry for him, because he is a sad, sad creature. Beautiful and terrible and doomed. All his life, he has been so used to being the best, no matter what it is that he is doing. There is no room for mercy, and especially no room for pity. He can distribute pity in tiny amounts, but it is something that he never wishes to receive. He would rather she throw anything else at him - her hate, her anger, her scorn - but her pity is something that he cannot stand. Not from the likes of anyone. Not now, not ever. But right here, right now, stands a young woman before him who is looking at him, really looking, who can see through him. It makes him vulnerable and he feels helpless, like there is no place left for him to runs, and he feels as though he has been running his entire life.

She tilts her head, and he observes the way that her hair sways from one side to the other in a single motion. He is reaching his fingers out to touch it, barely aware that they are trembling-

"Good night, Odair," she says in a sad voice, and then the closeness of her is suddenly gone as she opens the door and heads inside.

He stands there for a very long time, and he is not aware of it. When he finally makes a move, it is not to head out into the Capitol streets to add another woman to his endless list of conquests, but to his room, where he lies awake, staring at the ceiling for several hours before he finally falls into a dark abyss of sleep.

Johanna Mason is mentoring the next day when she saunters up to him. "She's the one, isn't she?" She smirks at him, looking very triumphant.

"Who is what?" He doesn't turn to look at her.

"That girl Tribute that volunteered this year," she chirps. "Annie."

"What of her?" He keeps his voice carefully neutral, as though he is disinterested. Which he isn't, of course.

"She's the one that you're in love with, right?"

He turns now. "Is it that obvious?" he sighs.

"Not at first," she laughs. "But upon closer observation, yes."

"Mmm," he responds.

"She's a keeper, Finnick."

"But she doesn't want me," he says.

"Still?" Johanna raises her eyebrows. "I'm liking her more and more by the minute."

"Shut up." He shoves her playfully.

She shoves him right back. "Well then, what is it?" She stares at him.

"She's afraid of being with me," he says calmly.

"So convince her otherwise." Johanna winks at him.

"Why don't you do it yourself if you're so interested?" he sighs.

She laughs. "Oh, I will, Finnick, but I'm not the one who happens to be desperately in love with her." She pats his shoulder, then turns on her heel to leave. "I'll see you later."

He nods, and then his eyes go back to watching Annie, who is studiously ignoring him.


	11. Part 11 : You're A Beautiful Kind of Dif

Part 11: You're A Beautiful Kind of Different

During dinner, they are all sitting at their table. Eliot is chatting animatedly with Annie, who is spreading the butter on her freshly baked bread with her knife. Mags is paying attention to their every word, but the only thing that Finnick can do is stare stupidly at Annie. He is so busy following the movements of her face that he does not realize what she is doing until the sharp whir of the butter knife - which, since it is from the Capitol, is not blunt at all, but incredibly sharp - jolts him out of his reverie.

He looks at Annie, who has calmly leaned back in her seat. She watches her butter knife whiz past his ear and land into the wall behind him. "What on earth-"

"Reflexes, Odair." She gives him a lazy smile. "I thought that you were supposed to have some of the best?"

Mags and Eliot are shaking with laughter, and Annie is quirking her eyebrow at him. He wonders what were to happen if he were to inform her that she knows all about his reflexes during that one night that they shared. But no, he will not. To say that would be to damage them further, to smite something that is beautiful and that he replays over and over again in his mind. So instead, he smiles at her, and then gives a shrug of his shoulders. "If you say so."

He walks back up to the roof that night, because he knows that she will be there, waiting. She doesn't turn around this time. "Hello, Odair," she says in a tired voice.

"Annie." He acknowledges her with a nod of his head and places his fingers on the cold stone bricks.

"Do you really have nothing better to do?" She sounds amused, but tired as well.

"You should get some sleep," he informs her. "You need to keep up your strength for the Games."

"Do I really?" she asks. "I don't even know if I can win, Odair."

"Yes," he says. "You owe me that much."

"I owe you?" Her voice is rising in anger, and now she does turn around to look at him. "Since when did I owe you anything, Odair?"

"Prove to me that you're not a coward." He presses his lips to her forehead, and without waiting for a reply, heads back inside. There. He knows that those words, if anything, are what will propel her in the arena. She will want to prove to his stupid self that she isn't afraid at all.

It is the day of the scoring next. Annie avoids his gaze at the table, instead absorbing herself in yet another conversation with Eliot and Mags. Weaving nets. Throwing knives. That is what she is good at, her most skilled areas. Well, besides the way that she moves in water. But there is no swimming pool in the Training Center, and she will not be able to show the Gamemakers the beauty of her movements within the clear liquid. He isn't surprised when she scores a nine. Little Eliot scores an eight, and his tiny face beams with pride. He is so happy that a part of Finnick breaks when he looks at this small boy in front of him, this boy who may die in the Games. He knows that if Annie does not win, this is who he wants to triumph.

He is back on the roof that night. "I come up here at night to look at the stars," she greets him.

He looks up into the night sky. "They're beautiful."

Out of the corner of his eye, he can see her smiling. "They'd be even more beautiful if all of the city lights were off."

He grins back at her. "You got a nine today," is all that he can say.

"That I did," she nods.

"I suppose there's some hope for you after all." He means to say it in a light-hearted tone, but something within him breaks, and his voice breaks with it.

She puts her hand on his arm. "Odair," she says.

"Yes?" He looks at her.

"Nothing." She shakes her head.

"What?" He is seized by an insatiable curiosity now.

"You know, maybe it's because I'm going to die," she began.

"You're not going to die, Annie," he says. "Don't talk like that."

She turns to look at him, and her eyes are asking him not to interrupt her, so he stops talking. "I'm scared," she says.

"Scared of what?" he whispers.

"I know how you are with women, Odair. You take them and you use them, and then you throw them away."

"Annie, you're different from the rest of them."

"So it was better if I left first. I didn't want to have to hear some speech from you where you told me that you'd rather we be friends, because I-"

"Annie!" he shouts.

"Yes?" She is looking up at him, and he wants to wrap her up in his arms and kiss her with every fiber of his being. He wants to inhale the heady scent of her hair and kiss every inch of her pale body, wants to give everything that he has to her.

"You're different," he says.

"Isn't that what you say to all of them?" She crosses her arms. "That they're different, and that you'll never leave them?"

"You're different," he insists.

"Why?" She looks as though she wants to cry.

"Because I love you," he says it simply. The night air around him seems to let out a soft sigh once he utters those words. He says it as though it is a fact - like the fact that the sun rises in the sky, like the fact that his mother and father are both long dead and gone, like the fact that the stars were beautiful at night, like the fact that she is the best he has ever had. Because it is a fact, it is an accepted truth of the world.

"Oh," she says. Then, "That's not something one hears everyday, is it?" He shakes his head. "And you don't says that to any of them, do you?" He shakes his head once more. She looks at him as though she is seeing him for the first time, and there is such wonder in her eyes as she drinks him in. "You really love me," she says breathlessly.

"I do," he nods, and then he steps towards her and envelops her in his arms, relief and warmth spreading throughout him as he feels her small form pressing into him. "I love you, you crazy, deranged, insane young woman."

She laughs into his coat, and her head nestles against his chest. "Stay with me?" she murmurs.

He nods, and they walk back to her room. She is tired, so tired, that she falls asleep almost immediately. He watches her as they lie in the bed until her breathing becomes even and steady and she has drifted off into the world of dreams. There is a beautiful smile on her face, and her fingers find his. The world could end right now and he wouldn't care. He has all that he needs right here, and that is all that matters.

Of course, the world has other plans. In the morning, they will have to wake up and head down to breakfast. Eliot chirps out how adorable they look, holding hands, and Mags gives them a knowing smile.

The next two days seem to pass by much too quickly. Every moment with her is precious, every moment apart when she must train for the Arena filled with worry as he wonders if she can survive these Games. Then he chides himself, because he cannot be thinking like that. He has to think that she will, because he knows that she has a good chance at it. She is so strong, so beautiful, so vibrant, so full of life - she cannot stop living now, for that would be a waste. Besides, she is a Career, so the odds are already in her favor. He knows that she will refuse his offer, so he does not tell her that he will be sponsoring her and Eliot in the arena. She would approve of him helping Eliot, but she would go on a long spout about how she doesn't need him to protect her, that she can take care of herself. He knows that she can, but even the strongest of the strong are slowly broken when they enter the arena, and if there is one thing that Finnick cannot stand, it is seeing people become slowly, excruciatingly shattered.

The night before the Games, they are both up on the roof again. They are simply standing there, bodies a few inches apart, not touching, looking up at the beautiful, starry sky. But this is one of the happiest moments of his life, being able to enjoy the peace and serenity before the storm that is surely to come, being able to be here with the person that he loves most in the world. He is content. Happy. In love. Tonight, the world is his. Everything will be taken from him tomorrow, but he will not spend this precious time with her thinking about the horror that is sure to begin in a matter of hours. There is no use spending his time with her thinking such horrid thoughts.

He looks at her, at how her beauty is so natural, how she doesn't even have to try like the others do, doesn't have to primp herself up like some ridiculous doll and end up looking like a wounded animal. "You look better without it," he smiles at her.

"What?" she looks at him, startled.

"Makeup," he laughs.

She grins at him. "I felt like an idiot with all of that on."

"You did look pretty ridiculous," he winks at her.

She gives him a playful shove, and then they are both laughing.

"The stars are beautiful at night," she says after a long moment.

He nods. "They are," he murmurs softly.

She turns to him, and her eyes are gazing up at his. "But you're just as - no, you're more than - beautiful." Her fingers reach out and trace the outline of his face, moving slowly from his forehead, then to his eyes, his nose, his cheeks, his chin, and finally, his lips.

She is the most beautiful person or thing that he has ever seen. "No, I'm not." He shakes his head, his voice a whisper. "You are."

Then he is kissing her, and she lets out a soft sigh. Her fingers are resting in his hair, and he pulls her closer to him, closing the space between them. There is a hunger between them, hunger that needs to be fed right now, because who knows if they will ever see each other again? She is doubtful of it, he is sure of it, but neither of them can fully believe that she will either survive the Games or perish.

They do nothing else that night other than the meeting of their lips. With other women, he has only ever been satiated when his body joined with theirs, but with Annie, it is not and has never been like that. All they need is the crashing of their lips together in a hungry frenzy. Simply being able to have her smile at him, to have her next to him, to be able to see her - that is enough for him.

Instead of doing anything, he holds her that night. Neither of them can sleep, so they spend the few short hours that they have left talking as they lie together on the bed. His fingers are running through her beautiful hair, and her head is rested against his chest, listening to the sound of his heart. They fall asleep eventually, but only for a brief slumber of what must have been an hour and a half at the most.

When they wake up, she lies on top of him, their foreheads touching, her fingers running through his hair. "I love you," she says quietly.

He kisses her nose. "You're going to come back," is all he says.

They lie there in silence, gazing at one another for a few more minutes before they get up, for the inevitable has come. He brings her to the roof before dawn. Eliot has already headed to the arena, and so it is just the two of them, before any of the other Tributes show up. A hovercraft is waiting for her, but he is Finnick Odair, and so they allow him and Annie to have one minute of privacy as her stylist waits by impatiently.

"I love you," he says as he hugs her, saying it loud and clear into her hair.

"I know," she replies. "I think I always knew that." She gives him a smile, and it breaks him once more. He is going to be such a mess later, but he cannot break down, not now, not in front of her.

So instead of responding with words, his lips lean forward, closing the space between them, and he pours everything that he is into this kiss, because it may be the last that they ever share. She is kissing him back, wildly, giving him everything that she is in it. She breaks it off after a minute, and her hands slide down from his shoulders to slip into his fingers.

She extracts her right hand and reaches into her pocket, taking out the glass seashell that he made for her what seems like so long ago. The day that began a long, painful year of his life where there was no Annie. The day that he forgot about her and had chosen Celia Mayton. If he didn't know better, he would say that that time was years and years ago.

"It's your token for the arena," he breathes out in amazement. "You never threw it away?"

"No." She shakes her head. "I kept it."

Then the only thing that he can hold onto is her left hand with his right one. His eyes are begging, pleading, but he cannot stop what must come. Her stylist comes, and there is a sad look in his eyes, and they say what he will not say aloud. That Finnick needs to let Annie go, and needs to let her go now.

Finnick will not let go of her hand until the last moment, when she is up the steps of the hovercraft and he must finally release her. Then he is stepping back onto the roof, and her hands are pressed against the round glass door of the hovercraft as it takes her away. Her eyes never leave his, and he stands rooted to his spot on the roof, even after the hovercraft is long gone, even after it is no longer even a tiny speck in the distance.

He trudges down to breakfast, and Mags puts a comforting hand on his shoulder. And suddenly he is frightened, so frightened for Annie, because what if she doesn't come back? Then he is chiding himself for being so ridiculous, because she is one of the strongest of the strong, and why is he thinking this way? But even though she is, the other side of his brain points out, how many of the strongest have died in the arena? Countless numbers upon numbers. Then he is having a little internal argument with himself, and it is no use resisting it.


	12. Part 12 : How To Turn Someone Mad

Part XII: How To Turn Someone Mad

The Games start off well enough. All of the water in the arena is salt, and the supply in Annie's backpack soon runs out, despite her careful rationing. There is only one day in every three when it rains, and during those days, it is only for thirty precious minutes. The only food that there seems to be in the arena are deadly animals with venomous stings, and fish - everywhere, fish immersed in sea-water. He uses all of the money that he has to send her and Eliot water, medicine, those chocolate chip cookies that she enjoys so much. Annie is grateful, but he can tell from her look that she doesn't need him to worry so much about her. But he does anyway, even though he knows that she is capable and can fend for herself.

They are one week into the Games when she saves Eliot, who comes crashing into her, a pair of the other Careers hot on his heels. "Allies?" she asks after she helps him up.

The small boy nods, and their pact is made. Annie throws one of her knives into the incoming Career's chest, and he falls to the ground, dead. The cannon booms, his partner runs off, Annie retrieves her knife, and then she and Eliot are running away from the scene. They sleep up in the trees, take turns with the watch. They hunt together, weave nets, strategize. Finnick is glad to see Annie smiling and laughing, and he is happy that someone is taking care of Eliot inside the arena. He is such a fragile-looking child, and even though he is strong, Finnick is afraid for him.

They have been allies for five day when it happens. It is night-time, and it is Eliot's turn to keep watch. Annie is asleep in the tree, safely stowed inside the sleeping bag that they share. Eliot makes the mistake of making his way out of the tree to go to the bathroom. He has always done this previously, something that Annie has warned him not to do, not when she is asleep. But he doesn't want to wake her, so he slips out quietly.

Annie wakes up after the first piercing shriek. "Eliot?" she whispers, her eyes wide with worry. But she already knows what has happened, and she slips quietly out of the tree with her knives. She hurries towards the source of the endless screaming, and she sees that one of the other Career girls has him in a tight grip. She is stabbing and cutting him again and again with her knife, and there are gashes all over. The blood is spilling out and flying, splattering its surroundings with a sickening sound. "Stop it!" Annie is screaming, not caring who hears her.

"Annie?" Eliot manages to croak out, his eyes flickering open. "Run!" he screams at her.

"Eliot!" she screams.

"Shut up, bitch!" the other girl shouts, and then she plunges her knife into Eliot's stomach. "Shut up or he dies!"

Eliot is such a brave little boy, but he lets out an involuntary cry. Annie has tears that are streaming down her cheek, and she is holding her mouth, doing her best not to retch onto the floor or break out into another flood of screams. There is more blood now, blood everywhere, anywhere.

"Run!" Eliot shouts at her. "Run, Annie!"

"I told you to shut up!" the other girl shrieks, and in a moment of rage, she takes her knife and slices his head off in one clean move.

The cannon booms as Eliot's head rolls to the floor. Annie is screaming, over and over, and then she takes her own knife and runs at the girl. She has an advantage, because this move is unexpected. Annie tackles her to the floor, her knife raised high, and she is stabbing and stabbing and stabbing, stabbing the girl in the face and in the neck and in her chest, letting out a scream of anguish and rage as she does so. She is stabbing the girl long after the cannon has boomed, until she is showered in blood that is all over her face and her shirt and her pants and her hands. When she seems to realize this, she heads over to Eliot, to the two pieces of his body. His mouth is open in a silent scream of horror and warning, in that last moment when he was screaming at Annie to run for her life.

That is when the screaming begins once more, but this time it doesn't stop. The hovercraft comes and picks up the three pieces of the two bodies, and Annie is still screaming as she runs away, drenched in blood, with no destination in mind. Eventually she finds a cave, where she manages to hide herself, murmuring Eliot's name again and again, screaming into her shirt, tearing at the wall, her fingernails bloody from the effort.

It doesn't matter how many silver parachutes Finnick sends to her, because nothing seems to matter anymore. She doesn't eat, doesn't hunt, doesn't do anything but hide.

It is three days later when an earthquake shakes the entire arena, breaking a dam. Water spills out, and it is flooding everywhere. The level of it is rising and rising, and Annie simply floats. She floats as the Tributes around her drown, their screams meaning nothing to her. She floats. As she floats and lets the water carry her aimlessly, she reaches into her pocket and finds the glass seashell that Finnick made for her. She cradles it in her hands as though it were a little baby, as though it is the most precious thing that she has ever seen. He doesn't know it, but as she floats, she is sane for a few minutes. She thinks of him, of her promise to him that she will come back, and so she allows herself to survive rather than drown with the water. The only words that she says are "Eliot" and "Finnick", over and over again. By the second day, she is the only one left. The speaker announces that she is the winner. The hovercraft comes and brings her back. She is shivering from pneumonia, but she doesn't seem to notice. Finnick is banging on the glass door where the doctors are inspecting her health, doing their best to stabilize her.

But it all means nothing, because she is gone. When they finally let him in to see her, they are doing their best to restrain her. She is hysterical, crying and screaming and very much insane. "Annie," he says, but he already knows that she is long gone.

This is the worst sort of pain, because when her eyes turn to see him, when she really, truly, sees him, he can see that she does not know who he is. "Who are you?" she whispers, frightened. But she has stopped screaming.

"Finnick," he says, swallowing the lump of pain in his throat.

"Finnick," she repeats slowly.

"Do you know who you are, Annie?" he murmurs gently.

"No." She shakes her head. "No," she says. "Annie." A pause. "Annie?"

"Yes," he whispers. "That's your name."

Her eyes widen. "Eliot," she breathes out. "Annie didn't save Eliot," she says, and then she begins to sob again, and soon the sobs turn into hysterical screams.

The doctors come in again, and Finnick is shouting at them not to touch her, the filthy bastards, but they sedate her anyway, and soon she is knocked out. "I'm so sorry, Annie," he whispers as he stares at her. And he is, because this is all his fault. If he hadn't been so stupid, so proud, if he hadn't goaded her into volunteering for the Games, if he hadn't called her a coward, if he hadn't made her want to prove to him that she could win, none of this would have happened. The weight of it is so much to bear, and he begins to cry, the tears streaming down his cheeks as he realizes that he has ruined the one beautiful thing that has happened to him.

They have to inject multiple drugs into her system when they make her watch the recap of the Games. She watches the beginning in silence, but when they show Eliot's death, she begins to scream. No one hears, because the drugs have somehow taken away her voice. No one can hear her silent screams but Finnick, who is watching her, and he feels as though he is being ripped apart, watching the pain that she is going through. But he cannot go to her, cannot run to her and hold her in her arms as she shakes and claws against him, because he will just make it worse for her if he does that. The Capitol would want to make an example out of him caring for some insane young woman who they believe won in an uninteresting way.


	13. Part 13 : Ashes, Ashes, We All Fall Down

Part XIII: Ashes, Ashes, We All Fall Down

Her mother cannot seem to take responsibility when they come back to District 4. She falls into another depression, and she stays holed up inside her new room in their new house in the Victor's Village. Finnick decides that if her mother will not care for her own daughter, he will. He owes Annie that much and so much more. He will not allow the doctors to come and take her away, will not allow them to strap her to a table and feed her drug after drug after drug, inject her with syringe after syringe.

He wraps the sheets around her every night, lies next to her and slips his fingers into hers. He cradles her to him, and it breaks him so much to see that she does not know who he is. Her eyes are always darting around when they are open, wide and scared. Nightmares consume her every night. She screams for Eliot, begging for him to forgive her. Some nights Finnick wakes to find Annie on top of him, stabbing him again and again with an imaginary knife, thinking that he is the girl who murdered Eliot. And he lets her blows land on him, because he wants to feel something, wants to be punished by what he most surely deserves for doing this to her.

She barely ever eats, and although Annie was never fat, now she is thinner than ever. Her eyes are empty, and soon enough she has become skin and bones. One day he walks into the kitchen to find it in a complete wreck. She is stabbing at the wood again and again, imagining that it is the girl who killed Eliot so mercilessly. She is screaming and screaming, and Finnick runs to her, snatching the knife out of her hands. She is beating her hands against his chest, and then she begins to sob, over and over again, and he holds her in his arms.

There is one night when he wakes up to find her gone from the bed. He dashes down to the kitchen, and she is standing in the middle of it, a bloody knife in her hand. It takes all of his willpower not to scream when she turns around to look at him as she drops the knife at her feet, a loud clattering sound on the floor, because she has stabbed herself all over, over and over again in the places where the pain was inflicted to Eliot. The only place that she has not touched is her neck, and Finnick knows that if he had not woken up when he had, if he had woken up one minute, one second later, he would have found her in a bloody heap on the kitchen floor, dead to the world. Dead and gone forever. His shaky fingers reach for the telephone and he calls the doctor. After he hangs up, he rushes to her, cradling her body to his, her blood seeping all over his clothes and soaking into his skin. When the paramedics arrive a few minutes later, they rush her to the hospital with a hovercraft, and he holds her hand the entire time. Her eyes look empty, and he can feel her pulse slowing down. He is yelling at her to stay with him, because she can't leave him here with nothing else worth living for, she can't.

They discharge her a month later, and when her blank eyes look through him, Finnick vows then and there that he will make the Capitol pay for what they have done to her. They have taken someone so beautiful and made her so irreparably damaged, so broken and no longer herself. But who is there to turn to? Who can he trust with this information?

He finally tells Mags one day on one of the rarely used paths from the Victor's Village to the market. She puts her finger to his lips and gives him a slight shake of her head. "Patience, Finnick," she says. "You must wait for the right time."

"And when will that be?" he hears himself asking her.

"Soon enough," she replies.

But for now, he must wait, must bide his time. Annie cries, begs him not to let her go back to the hospital. He locks up all of the kitchen utensils, because he knows that if he does not, she will kill herself the next time she gets a hold of a knife.

He takes her to their lake, and he can see the wonder in her eyes. He brings her to the ocean, and she looks as though she wants to dive into the crashing waves and never resurface.

There is one night when he has left the bathroom door unlocked. He has just finished drying his hair and wraps the towel around his waist when he realizes that she has entered the room and is staring at him. He suddenly feels very hot, and he knows that it is not from the steam that is radiating from the bathtub. "Finnick," she says simply as she walks to him, her fingers tracing the contours of his chest. He trembles visibly, shivers even though the room is drenched in heat. It drives him crazy that he cannot touch her the way that they once did, but he knows that he mustn't. Only when she is all better, when she is fully healed, when she is sane. Sanity. Until then, he must wait, however impatiently, much like how he waits for his revenge on the Capitol.

When he goes back to the Capitol the next year, he goes as a guest, not a mentor. He knows that last year is the first and last time that he will ever mentor for these sadistic Games. He instructs Annie's mother to take care of her daughter, and she agrees. He cannot help it when he turns to the comfort of other women. He knows that it is wrong, because it is a betrayal of Annie, a betrayal of _them_, of what they shared and still do share. But he gives himself nonetheless, because he thinks that perhaps they can satiate the hunger that he can no longer fulfill with Annie. He is wrong, of course, because none of them even come close to the perfection that is Annie, none of them can ever share what he had that is so special with her. He knows now that the one time he had with her is the one time in his entire, pathetic life that he was able to make love to someone, that everything that came before and afterwards were only shrouds, was only the physical act of two bodies coming together.

He is in the stables one early afternoon when he finds a pile of sugar cubes, and he inhales them, allowing himself to believe, even if it is only for a single delusional moment, that she is right there with him, smiling and holding his hand, her head rested on his shoulder.

He discovers something else on his visit. His patience for revenge, which has been running thin, finally bears fruit. Johanna informs him that Mags wants to meet up with him, and so he follows the other Victor into an empty room, one that, for the moment, is not under Capitol surveillance. It is here that he meets a man named Plutarch Heavensbee. It is here that he learns that Mags and Johanna and a string of other Victors from Districts 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 11, and the only Victor from 12 are all part of an underground resistance movement, that they are all banded together by some cause or the other, but in the end, they all wish to see the Capitol overthrown. He meets some of them, and their intent is clear: to destroy and wipe out the Capitol. He must keep up his facade of not knowing anything, of loving the Capitol. But to know that there were other people who were united in their wish to see the Capitol destroyed gives him hope, lets him get through each painful day.

When he comes back to District 4, he finds Annie hiding inside the shower in his house, her form crumpled into a little ball, hugging herself. She has left the faucet on, and her clothes are drenched. She is soaked, and he does not know how long she let the nozzle run for - the entire Games? For three and a half weeks? She is shivering, and he gets in the shower with her, peeling off her clothes and washing her since she cannot do it herself. His fingers running through her hair, massaging the shampoo into the brown tresses, trailing the sponge all over her body and then replacing the sponge with his fingers. He wraps her up in several towels afterwards. When he picks up the phone she screams, begging him not to take her to the hospital, not to let those doctors inject her again. He wraps his arms around her, dries her hair and speaks in a soothing voice to her. She falls asleep, and her fever is high, so very high, but he does not take her to the hospital, because he made a promise to her that he will not ever break, not if he can help it. He nurses her back to health, washing her in the shower and staying up with her late into the night, holding her hand and placing the wet towels on her forehead, patiently waiting for her to finish drinking the medicine.

He storms to her house, shouting at Annie's mother, asking why she didn't take care of her daughter like she promised. But the woman seems to be so far gone. It is as though Annie's insanity is her husband's death all over again, and Finnick, however much he hates her for letting Annie wander off by herself, understands. Because it _is _as though Annie has died.

There are some days when she seems to recognize who he is, when she is her old self once more. But the next day she will be gone once more, insane and crazy. And each time it happens he does not hate her, but the Capitol, more and more, and the more he loathes them the more and more he loves Annie.

The years pass like this. One year, two, three, four, and finally five. No one can understand why he stays with Annie. They say that he can do better, that she is a waste of his time. He ignores their raised eyebrows and amused glances. Some days he will lash out at them, imagining that they are the Capitol, that he can use them as practice targets for his anger. He ignores their whispers, and he goes on taking care of Annie, taking care of her the way that she took care of him when he was broken and so far gone.

The more time that passes, the more times there are when Annie is sane, and these periods last longer and longer each time, building up slowly and steadily. Finally, during the fourth year, she is sane. Finnick has learned that one must not mention the terrible event of the Games, must not bring them up unless she speaks of them first, because they are what drives her back into insanity. A year of sanity is what the earth gives her. She is his for that year, just like he has always been hers. He takes her to their lake, to the boat that he has bought and named after her as they travel and fish together on the ocean. So long as he keeps the knives locked out of sight, they can bake cookies. They lie together on the bed during the night and in the quiet mornings and huddle together, so precious to one another. Their kisses and lovemaking are slow at first, slow because they want to believe that they have time that they both know will soon run out. But as time goes on, everything becomes faster and more frenzied, sometimes in-between, and sometimes back to a slow pace, because their time is running short. For the rebellion has been planned for this year, and there is the possibility that neither of them will live to see it through, to see a triumph over the Capitol. Here and now may be all that they have, and they are making the most out of it, as much as they can.


	14. Part 14 : The Arena

Part XIV: The Arena

When he hears of the new Quarter Quell, he is frozen with fear. Fear, because there is a gnawing sense that Annie may be chosen. Mags comes over after the broadcast, holds his hand. She looks at him, and she promises that she will not let that happen to Annie.

But the moment comes and Annie is chosen anyway. And then it is upon them. The sanity leaves her eyes, and she is gone from him, gone. He had suspected for a while that she had been spiraling downward, but the announcement that proclaimed her as chosen pushed her past the edge. Screaming and crying and clawing at her hair and skin. Insane, her sanity lost. But Mags - loving, caring, all-seeing Mags - steps forward, volunteering in her place. Finnick feels a rush of guilty relief, for he knows that there is a high likelihood that Mags will not survive these Games. But that she is doing this for Annie, doing this even though she knows that the odds are not in her favor - it makes him love her even more than he already does. And he is so scared suddenly, because they are all that he has, Annie and Mags. To lose Annie will be the worst of all, but he cannot deny the fact that to lose Mags will be to lose a part of who he is as well. Before they must leave on the train to the Capitol, he sits in the Justice Building, visited by a now-gone Annie and her mother. He looks at her mother, and he stares at her for a long time. "You know what you have to do, don't you?" he asks in a quiet voice.

She nods. "I do."

He isn't sure that she does, because if she does not take care of Annie, something bad could happen. "You didn't the last time that I entrusted her to you."

"I will this time," her mother replies, and she is suddenly full of life, life that she has not had for years since her husband's death and Annie's bittersweet victory in the arena.

Relief courses through Finnick, and she leaves the room to give him and Annie privacy. She is cradled in a ball on the floor, rocking backwards and forwards. "Annie," he whispers, and she stops rocking. She stares at him as she slowly raises her head, and looking at her like this breaks him. He has been broken by seeing her like this so many times, but the pain is still fresh and blinding each time that it happens, each time that it lashes out at him. "I love you," he says, and he wraps his arms around her, pressing his face into her beautiful hair.

Then they are yelling at him to get on the train, and he kisses her forehead before her mother comes to take her away. He exchanges a nod with the woman who he is now trusting with Annie, who must now make up for what she has not been able to do before. "I'll come back," he says loudly, although he is not very sure of that. There is the plan to break them out of the Arena, but who knows if it will work? And even if it does, the Capitol will react fast, will retaliate quickly. The possibilities are endless, but most of them come with an unhappy ending all wrapped up, all neatly packaged into a falsely cheery parcel.

Then there is the arrival in the Capitol to contend with. Where Annie was a girl, a daughter, a creature of the water, Katniss Everdeen, the girl on fire, is exactly that. A creature of full of fire. She reminds him faintly of Annie, strong and hating the Capitol with every inch of her being. But unlike Annie, she seems to have no clue whatsoever as to what is going on.

He finds the sugar cubes in the stables again, inhaling them and then eating them, much to Johanna and Mags's amusement. But he doesn't care, because it is as if Annie is with him, even if only for a brief moment.

There is a meeting again, one where they agree with Haymitch that they will look after Katniss and Peeta. He doesn't need to be told that the girl on fire is trying to kill him. One glance of hers and he can tell that he is someone she wouldn't mind having to kill. Perhaps she is even itching to do so.

He picks Annie's favorite poem of his about her to recite to the Capitol. It's really ridiculous how they all swoon and think that he is talking about them, when really, he is only thinking about her. But he says that she is in the Capitol anyway, because all he has to do is inhale the sugar cubes and there she is. He is sure that the Capitol knows what she is to him, for he hasn't been all too careful about concealing that. He should have exercised more caution about that, but he doesn't regret ever loving Annie. But there is no use, he thinks. They know, and they will use it against him.

It is amusing to see Katniss try to kill him in the arena. But she is the mockingjay, and if she has half the brain that Haymitch claims she does, she will figure out everything soon enough. He looks at her and Peeta, the way that the boy loves her and how she is able to see it but not really fully grasp the concept. And he sees that Katniss loves Peeta back, loves him but is unaware of the way that she does, much like him and Annie.

The loss of Mags crushes him, because now there is only one person left in the world who is so near and dear to him. One person, and if they are not careful, the Capitol will capture her when they break the force field and torture her for information, for information that she will not know since she is gone once more. Annie was half his family, and now she is all that he has.

The jabberjays with the sounds of Annie screaming in pain nearly drives him to insanity. He had resolved not to show any emotion about this, not to murmur her name in his sleep during the nights before this attack. He had to clamp his mouth shut, shove the scarf that Annie wove him between his lips in order to not emit his whispers of her name. The Capitol was very aware of his relationship with her, but it wouldn't hurt if he didn't make a sound about her in the arena, would it? How wrong he was. Of course they would make him go through this torture, cruel and sadistic as they are. His eyes are squeezed shut and his hands are clamped against his ears, trying to drown out the sound, but he cannot block it out at all. This is the one thing that he cannot fight against, that he is helpless against, that he yields victory to so easily. He sees the way that Katniss looks at him the whole time, from the moment that they hear the first shriek to when he returns from the water, he can see it. That she seems to realize something about him. That she pities and has a new respect for him, because he is not a cold-blooded, ruthless, heartless killer after all. He is not a vain, beautiful young man. He is not just another Victor who has been brainwashed by his Victory in the Games, who has pledged himself so happily to the Capitol. He is someone who actually has feelings, who cares about another human being besides himself - he is someone who is painfully in love.

There is no use hiding the nightmares after that, no use in clamping his mouth shut, in shoving her scarf inside. Whenever his eyes close all that he can see is Annie. Sometimes Mags will appear as well. They will be reaching out to him, and Annie is inside some sort of metal cage. He will always be able to almost reach her, but the moment that he breaks the cage door open, she will disappear, but her screams will be all around him. He screams for her, shouts, yells, cries, but it is all of no use. They are using her against him, and his nightmares flood him with hopelessness and despair. They know that it is the one fight where he yields victory to his enemy to so easily, when they use her so. Not sleeping is better. At least insomnia will not drive him to the insanity that the nightmares are sure to bring him to. He is on the precipice of a breaking cliff, and just one little push will drive him to madness.

When Katniss finally figures it all out and breaks the force field, he immediately wants to run to get Peeta and Johanna. But he cannot. He is frozen, because the force field struck him, the shock went through him. He is lucky that he barely brushed against the tree when the arrow hit it, but it is enough to render him conscious but immobile. He needs to get Peeta because if he does not, Katniss will be lost like he is, will slowly go mad. And Johanna, his friend who is almost like family to him. Almost, but not quite. But he cannot let either of them be tortured by the Capitol.

Katniss tells him that they will use Annie for bait, and even though he already knows this, he has a primal instinct to grab her and shake her hard, to have her fight him to the death. It is insanity, but he cannot bear to have someone else say what they may do to Annie aloud. He does nothing but let out a strangled sob, though, because she is right. But he continues to hope anyway, because what else does he have to cling onto besides the cause that drives the rebellion?


	15. Part 15 : For You I Would Give Everythin

Part XV: For You I Would Give Everything

But of course all of his hoping is for naught, because the resistance picks him up, but not Peeta and Johanna. He needs to get Annie, needs to get her and her mother out before the Capitol reaches her first, before they come to torture her and drive her even more insane than they have already made her. He needs to bring her to the resistance, to the heart of the rebellion that she earnestly spoke of when they were young. He needs to bring her to District 13, the stronghold, the place where the Capitol cannot reach her - at least not without much effort.

It is not to be, because they capture Annie and her mother. He is screaming when he hears this piece of information, begins to shove himself against the wall, drives his body against it. He is a bloody mess, and they are doing his best to try and sedate him, but Finnick is a fighter, and he is able to fend so many of them off. He does not want a needle that will wipe him out. He needs to feel the raw pain that Annie is sure to be experiencing. And her mother - terrible guilt sweeps through him, because she made a promise to him, a binding promise that will now surely make the Capitol torture her for information that she does not know.

He is not comforted that they land safely in District 13, that they are welcomed like heroes. He is not comforted by the meetings where they all sit together and strategize plans. They don't understand his need to reach her. It is his fault that she is insane, and is furthermore his fault that the Capitol has taken her and are probably torturing her. They are torturing her, and she will die. She will die, and it will be his fault, and it will be his weight to bear, because he has condemned her to that fate. Him and no one else. He takes no comfort in his fellow rebels' reassurances that she will not be tortured like the rest because she is so far gone. And even if they do, it will not be so bad, they say. It will not be like the torture that Peeta and Johanna were sure to endure, they tell him. But they are lies. Lies, lies, lies. Veiled lies like the one that he told to Katniss, lies that consume him, that make him believe the exact opposite. They are driving him mad, and he knows that this is what it means to go insane. He begins to feel how Annie must have felt, hopeless and screaming. He wakes up at night, yelling, thrashing in the sheets. She reaches out to him in his nightmares. "Why don't you save me, Finnick?" she whispers, her fingers just touching his as they extend out of the cage that they are holding her in. "Why don't you ever come and save me, Finnick?" she murmurs. He is yelling and screaming her name, and he screams louder when they begin to inject her and torture her. She resists at first, and then her mouth opens and those horrid screams flood his ears. They hold him still, force him to watch her body contort in fear and pain, force him to watch her mouth emit bloodcurdling shrieks. And there is no one to wake him up, no one to hold his hand and shake him, to whisper to him that it is but a dream, because he knows that this is the truth, what is really happening while he is safely tucked away in District 13 like a coward.

Coward. He is the coward, not Annie. Of the two of them, he has always been the coward, has always been afraid. And fate has dealt them another ironic twist, because now he is nicely situated somewhere safe while she endures what should be his fate instead, his punishment.

He is aware of their gazes upon him, how they whisper about him. How they say that he is unpredictable, because everything that he does is motivated for and by Annie. He is dangerous, because he may go to the other side, may betray them if it means that Annie gets to live, if they will stop torturing her. He takes it all in, because he knows that if he isn't careful, he might end up doing just that. Betraying everything that he has worked for to save the young woman that he doomed to her fate, betraying everything that she believed in and would have fought for right to the very end. But right now it is too much to bear, so he politely excuses himself from another useless meeting before heading out. Patience, the rebellion tells him. Patience, because they must wait for the right time to strike at the Capitol to rescue Annie and her mother and Peeta and Johanna and the others.

There is the sound of footsteps behind him, and then a careful hand is on his shoulder. "Finnick," the voice says. "Finnick?"

He stares at her for a moment, unseeing, wishing that she were Annie. "Hello, Katniss," he says simply as he leans against the wall, his eyes no longer looking at her.

She shoots him a strange look before taking a deep breath. She seems to be struggling to find the right words to say to him. Finally, "It never gets easier, does it?"

"No." He is looking straight ahead. He doesn't want to feel her eyes boring into him, to see the pity and sadness and the same haunted look that he carries.

"She's with Peeta," Katniss goes on, not knowing what to say.

"Is that supposed to make it any better?" He lets out a strangled laugh.

"You said so yourself that it would be better for him since he doesn't know anything," she says in a fierce voice, as though she is trying to persuade him of a lost cause.

"I was making things easier for you, Katniss," he says, letting out a bitter sound. "You can't tell me that you honestly believe they won't torture him as much as they will Johanna?"

She ignores that, but out of the corner of his eye, he can see her biting her lower lip. "She's with them, and they won't let anything happen to her."

"That's a lie," he spits out, his voice harsh. "They won't even be able to help themselves, how do you think they're going to keep her from being tortured?"

She rests her cheek in the palm of her hand, and she is staring intently at him. "Because we have to have some hope we can hold onto, Finnick."

He turns to her, and he can see in her eyes that she earnestly believes what she is saying, that she is trying to keep herself sane while trying to bring him back to sanity at the same time. "The hope's all gone though."

"Only if we let it go, Finnick," she says earnestly. "Don't you see? By giving up already you're letting Annie down! You're not even choosing to believe that there might be a chance, because you're a coward-"

"Watch your mouth, little girl," he snarled. "I may be many things, but I am _not_ a coward."

"Prove it, then!" she shouts. "Prove that you'll fight for her, that you'll get her back from the Capitol! Because all I've seen you do since we've arrived in District 13 is sit around and mope about how she's gone! If you really are the man you claim you are, you'll get off your lazy high horse and do what you keep on saying you will!"

He has been wanting to explode at something, someone, for a very long time, and now he lets it all go. "Don't talk to me that way!" he roars. "You don't know anything that I've been through, don't you dare talk to me about being on a high horse! You're one to talk, all I see you doing all day long is whine about how soon we're going to swoop in and save your lover! Don't you understand that no matter how much you scream at Haymitch to hurry up and dash into the Capitol, don't you realize that that's exactly what they want you to do? You don't think that they're going to be waiting for you? They can't wait for you to go in there and get yourself blown up! Can't you see that-"

A door bangs open in the distance. "Will you two keep it down?" Haymitch hisses as he sticks his head out. "Some of us are having a productive meeting here!"

"Shut up!" Finnick and Katniss roar together as they turn to glare at him.

He looks taken aback, and they can hear him muttering a flow of obscenities before the door slams shut.

They stare at each other for a long moment before they both burst out into a stream of laughter. "We'll get them back, you know," Katniss says, her gaze determined as she turns to look at him.

He swallows. "How can you be so sure?"

"You'd know if she is dead," she says. "You'd feel it if she was gone." He doesn't answer her. "I'm right, aren't I?" He will not respond. "It's the same for Peeta," she says.

"Is that what keeps you going?" he asks her, swallowing. Everything that she says is true.

"Yes," she answers him, letting out a weary sigh. "To be honest, yes."

"You're right, you know." He stares at her.

"I know." She gives him a sad smile, and then he finds himself smiling back. He realizes that Katniss is the only one who understands, because she is the only one who is going through the same ordeal.

Finnick knows now that he will do anything to bring Annie back alive. Even if it means having himself killed in the process - perhaps he will offer them a trade, him for her, allow them to torture him in the way that they have undoubtedly tortured her - he will do it, because she is the only thing that matters. There is barely hope - only the most slightest, bleakest of its kind. There is hardly any to be found in these dark days. But knowing that she is alive is enough to sustain him, for now. He will fight for her until the very end - come out fighting. He is sure to kill more than his fair share of the Capitol's soldiers, and he knows that Annie will be busy giving them hell. Annie and Peeta and Johanna - they are fighters, and they will not give up without giving the Capitol a good dose of misery.

A few days later, Haymitch announces that they are ready to storm the Capitol. Finnick catches Katniss's eye, and she gives him a disbelieving smile. He dreams of Annie that night. Her fingers reach out to trace the lining of his face through the bars of her cage.

"Finnick." She smiles at him. "Finnick."

"Annie," he whispers in wonder. "Annie, are you all right?"

"Yes," she murmurs.

"I love you," he says, and it is only when her fingers trace a line down his cheek does he realize that tears are streaming down his face.

"I know," she whispers, smiling at him. "I've always loved you," she says.

She holds him through the bars, holds him as his fingers runs through her hair and he breathes in her scent.

Suddenly he is in the cage with her, and there is water being dumped onto them, buckets and buckets for a few moments, waterfall after waterfall. Then, the cage disappears and huge flames burst around them. Annie, his beautiful girl of water, is surrounded by fire. It is licking at her, the flames trying eagerly to eat her up. And suddenly Finnick is pulled away from her by an invisible force. Perhaps it is the flames, perhaps it is something else. But he most stand there as they hold him, as he struggles to reach her but knows that he cannot. He must get to her. "Annie!" he shouts.

She looks at him, and she is still sane. "It's fire, Finnick," she says in a soft voice. She is still dripping wet, and he is still struggling against invisible ropes. "I'm going to be all right," she says calmly.

"Annie!" he screams. "Annie, run!"

She gives him a sad smile and a reassuring shake of her head. "No, Finnick," she says. "Water never runs from fire." She looks at him, her eyes willing him to believe her. "It drowns it out in the end."

He is still screaming her name when he feels arms around him, arms that jolt him awake. He grabs whoever's wrist it is, and slams them against the wall with his other hand, his hand flying to their neck. After a few blinks, he sees that it is Katniss, and her eyes are wide. "You were having a nightmare," she says.

He lets go of her. "Thanks," he says, his voice hoarse. "Sorry about that." He gestures towards her hand and neck.

"No." She shakes her head. "Don't be. Your reflexes are up, Finnick. It's good, because we're going to need all of them today."

It is extremely dark as they walk outside of the tunnels, and he estimates that it must be two-thirty in the morning. They head to the looming hovercraft, where there are a few other rebels waiting. He is barely aware of eating his breakfast before the hovercraft launches off of the ground. He is probably going to die today. He and Katniss both. He has no delusions about that, no regrets. Only one, and it is that he will not be able to spend a lifetime with Annie. But by saving her he is giving her what leaving her at the hands of the Capitol cannot: a life to live. She will recover from her insanity, he knows. All he needs - all they need to do, together - is to get her and the rest of them out.

He closes his eyes. Annie. Annie. Annie. How he fell in love with her not once, not twice, but eighteen exhilarating times. Times that were sometimes messy and imperfect, that were either in happiness or in anguish, but the one thing that they all shared was the beauty in them. How he will fall in love with her once more when he saves her, if he is able to make it out alive. Their weekends on the ocean, their lazy days on the lake, the way that she looked at him. Her scarf that she gave him, how she kept his seashell. Her lips against his, their fingers entwined, his nose in her hair. Her hands in his hair, on his shoulders. Skin against skin. Her insanity and those days when she was healed. Her taking care of him, standing by him despite how horrid he must have been. The first day that they met. Annie. Everywhere, all around him, in the air that he breathes. She gives him all of her, and that is what he gives to her: all of who he is.

For she is his, and he is hers. And that is really all that matters, in the end.

**UPDATE: The sequel to this story, titled _Impossible_, is now posted. Thank you so much to all of you for your wonderful feedback and support!**


End file.
